LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

BTW — 

Shelf.__.Mli 
— -4**4 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 




OCT in 



fOn 



ECCE REGNUM. 

AN INQUIRY 

CONCERNING THE SCRIPTURE DOCTRINE 

OF 

THE KINGDOM OF GOD 

AND 

THE GLORY THAT SHALL BE REVEALED. 



BY WILLIAM R. JOSSLYN. 



• And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us— and we beheld his glory, as of 
the only begotten of the Father— full of grace and truth."— John 1. 14. 



10 






BOSTON: 

COPYRIOHT, 1884. 

H. L. Hastings, 47 Cornhill. 



Preface. 



We have reason to believe that we have been provi- 
dentially and spiritually led in the composition of this 
book. It will be observed that the two natures play an 
important part in the work, so much so that possibly 
it may serve to illustrate a Bible Beading, such as Mr. 
Moody gives upon the subject. It has been by following 
the principles herein involved that we have made our 
reckoning and arrived at our conclusions. Our object 
has been, after finding the truth, to make it plain and im- 
pressive upon the ordinary class of readers. So we have 
used but few words and avoided technical terms. Though 
the book has been an inquiry on our part yet we are aware 
that in some respects it assumes the character of a positive 
statement and absolute defence of Christian truth. That it 
is a defence of the truth, and because we believe we are 
clearly sustained by the Scriptures, must be our apology for 
all this. 

If we do not doubt, why should we hesitate to drive the 
nails and fasten them ? Are any offended, let them inquire 



ECCE REGNUM. 



for themselves candidly and diligently, and, perad venture, 
should they see the Kingdom of Heaven coming to earth 
according to the supernatural method in Christ rather than 
after the natural method through the wisdom of man, we 
believe their hearts would change and we should have their 
sympathy and encouragement. 

Abating all that is of imperfection in the book, we hope 
on the whole it may prove edifying and profitable to those 
who read, as revealing the nature and glory of Christ's 
Kingdom in such a way as that it may be received. And 
unto the Lord our God would we ascribe all the glory. 



Contents. 



PAGE. 

INTRODUCTORY 7 

PART lst—Negatively. 

THE KINGDOM NOT RITUALISM 14 

" POLITICS... 18 

" REFORMS 30 

44 " FORMALISM— The Temptation 35 

PART' 2d— Positively. 

THE KINGDOM UNFOLDED 46 

THE TRANSFIGURATION 53 

THE LIGHT OF PROPHECY 59 

41 HISTORY 65 

44 EXPERIENCE 79 

WISDOM 86 

RIGHTEOUSNESS 89 

SANCTIFICATION 97 

REDEMPTION 107 

REVIVAL 135 

DEATHLESS RAPTURE 144 

THE NEW CREATION 186 

THE KINGDOM COME 203 



ECCE REGNUM. 



" That which is born of the flesh is flesh ; and that which 
is born of the spirit is spirit. " 

"Marvel not that I said unto thee ye must be born again." 
— Jesus. John Hi, 6-7. 

11 This I say then, Walk in the Spirit and ye shall not fulfil 
the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the Spi rit 
and the Spirit against the flesh ; and these ere contrary the 
one to the other ; so that ye cannot do the things that ye 
would. "Gal.v, 16, 17. 

In every Christian there is found a twofold man, opposed, like their 
fruits, to one another ; this will more fully appear from the following 
statement : 

Adam Christ. 

Old Man New Man. 

Outward Man. ... ........ Inward Man. 

Old Faith .New Faith. 

Flesh Spirit. 

Nature Grace. 

Darkness Light. 

Tree of Death Tree of Life. 

Evil Fruit. . . '....' Good Fruit. 

Sin. Righteousness. 

Damnation Salvation. 

Death Life. 

Old Jerusalem New Jerusalem. 

Kingdom of the Devil Kingdom of God. 

Seed of the Serpent Seed cf God. 

Natural Man Spiritual Man. 

Image of the Earthly Image of the Heavenly. 

JohnAmdt, 1555-1621. 

True Christianity, B. ii, chap. 7. 



Introductory. 




; HE Kingdom of God was the great 
theme of our Saviour while He 
was here on the earth. He came to 
preach the Gospel of it, and He suf- 
fered and died to open a way of admis- 
sion into it. In His absence the Holy 
Spirit reveals it, and by the light He gives us 
we may enter into its mysteries, and discern 
enough, at least, to fill us with wonder and de- 
light in view of its nature and glory. 

As it is a subject ox the highest importance, 
it is but reasonable that we should seek it dili- 
gently. We are commanded to seek it first, 
and are assured that all other things shall be 
added. Let us look for it then in the Word of 
God, where alone it is to be found, and try to 



ECCE REGNUM. 



welcome every new revelation as an earnest of 
our rest in its blessedness. 

In reading the Evangelists we observe that 
the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Hea- 
ven are essentially one, and may be bnt inter- 
changeable terms to denote one and the same 
object. We say object, for thus it is, as it is 
susceptible of the definition given of a kingdom 
in the dictionary, and so embraces a territory, 
subjects, laws and a king. The Kingdom of 
God, as revealed in the Scriptures, in its 
completeness, exhibits all of these features ; so 
that by following the leadings of the Spirit, 
and comparing passage with passage, we have 
an object as tangible to faith as any of the 
kingdoms of this world are to sight. We have 
a real, literal kingdom, that is in a process of 
development, and is destined to supersede all 
other kingdoms, and be established on this 
earth in glory. 

It is the custom of some thinkers to resolve 
persons and things into principles, to make 
God even a principle of goodness, and Satan a 
principle of evil ; and thence, being rid of the 



INTROD UCTOR Y. 



Holy Ghost, dissolve the Kingdom into the love, 
righteousness, joy and peace of the natural 
heart — or, in other words, into a vague and 
dreamy sentimentalism. By the same reason- 
ing, sin, instead of being a transgression of the 
law, changes into injuriousness, and thus we 
have no God, but an impersonal abstraction, 
which may be anything — matter or Spirit — an 
image in the brain or in stone, according to the 
fancy of the worshipper. Now principles are 
seeds, they are substantial verities ; but they 
are so only as they are connected with person- 
ality, only as they center in the living God — 
Jehovah. God is the author of all seeds, and 
seeds contain in themselves all there is in the de- 
velopment from them, as the acorn contains the 
oak. The Bible is emphatically a book of prin- 
ciples. It is full of seed, texts from whose hid- 
den forces spring objective realities — e. g., we 
read: "the Kingdom of God is not meat and 
drink, but righteousness, peace and joy in the 
Holy Gliosis — Rom. xiv., 17. The Kingdom is 
all here essentially in its incipient or acorn state, 
but as it shall grow before us we may expect to 



10 ECCE REQNUM. 



see it burst the walls of the seed and leap up- 
ward, and like the mustard tree spread its 
branches through the whole Bible. As it grows 
by a law of the Spirit, it presses its way through 
the Old Testament and the New. It gathers in 
passage after passage of the Word of God, 
claiming all that the Holy Ghost teaches for it- 
self, and thus leavens, if we understand by the 
word simply assimilation, the whole Spiritual 
lump ; gathers together in one all of the ele- 
ments* that partake of its own peculiar nature 
and glory, and notlving else. While th,e Apos- 
tle Paul, who is the author of the text, gives us 
a seed in his definition of the Kingdom, that 
is, a point to start from, the Holy Spirit, whose 
law is freedom, leads us out from that which 
is hid to that which is manifest ; from the sub- 
jective to the objective, from the Kingdom in 
the heart to the kingdom in history and future 
on the earth. 

The Lord' s way is in growth from within, out. 

* Spiritual things attract Spiritual. Natural those that are natural. 
We are aware that the word leaven in Scripture is always a symbol 
of evil ; in no other sense can it be used with reference to the Kingdom 
of God unless it be that of assimilation. 



INTRODUCTORY. 11 



Accepting then the words of Paul in our 
heart, we would from the good seed of the Word 
grow into a knowledge of our subject. We 
would honor the dictum of the schoolmen, be- 
lieve first and then reason, and as we go on we 
would look up and say with the Psalmist, 
■ Shew me Thy ways, O Lord : teach me Thy 
paths. Lead me in Thy truth and teach me ; 
for Thou art the God of my salvation, on Thee 
do I wait all the day." We find a simple or- 
der in the passage we have quoted, and as it 
will be convenient to follow it we will do so. 



PART I. 



Negatively. 



\ HAT is not the Kingdom? It is 
not meat and drink, says the 
Apostle. This brings to mind 
another text: "And this I say, 
brethren, that flesh and blood can 
f^pk not inherit the Kingdom of God ; 
neither doth corruption inherit incorruption. v 
The Kingdom is not flesh and blood then ; it 
is not anything corruptible, neither does any- 
thing corruptible enter into it. Moreover, as 
flesh and blood has reference to the soul as 
well as to the body, to the carnal nature, or the 
old Adam, that we inherit at the first birth ; so, 
theji, the unregenerate nature is not a part of it. 




NEGATIVELY. 13 



Unregenerate persons who possess this nature, 
or those principles, laws or institutions that 
are but a development of it, do not belong to it 
essentially. The Kingdom is not born of the 
will of man, nor of the will of the flesh ; nei- 
ther is it united with the flesh, only as it is 
joined like Jacob and Esau in a struggle. It 
is in the flesh "in the world, but not of it ;" 
"for the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and 
the Spirit against the flesh, and these are con- 
trary one to the other, so that ye cannot do the 
things that ye would." Again, says the Apos- 
tle, "the carnal mind is enmity against God ; 
for it is not subject to the law of God, neither 
indeed can be."* This is a very important 
truth to be observed, if we would discern 
clearly the nature and glory of the Kingdom 
of God ; viz. : that it is something entirely dis- 
tinct, something to which the natural heart 
and all that is distinctively developed there- 
from is opposed. "That which is born of the 
flesh is flesh ;" and flesh and blood cannot in- 
herit the Kingdom of God. As this is so, we 

* Rom. viii., 7. 



14 



ECCE REGNUM. 



see that we cannot educate an unregenerate 
man into a saint, or an unregenerate world into 
the Kingdom of God. We see the necessity of 
regeneration, and as this does not take place 

but by the agency of the Holy Ghost, we see 
that He must come, or all the ministers and 
Churches labor in vain. We see the necessity 
of prayer, for God will be inquired of by the 
House of Israel. 

" Long as they live should Christians pray 
For while they pray they live." 



RITUALISM. 

But following on to understand the words of 
the Spirit, we notice that the expression meat 
and drink, as used by the Apostle, refers to 
religious rites and ceremonies ; therefore we 
say that the Kingdojn of God is not ritualism. 

There was a discussion in the early Churches 
about rites. Some were for circumcision and 
some were opposed ; some were for observing 
certain days, and others cared nothing about 
them ; some were particular about the use of 



l_ 

RITUALISM. 15 



meats and drinks that had been used in Pagan 
worship, others were not. So about rites they 
disputed. 

It was natural that they should do so, for the 
Churches were composed of members from dif- 
ferent nations. Those that had been reared 
under different religions sat side by side. Here 
was the converted Pagan and the Christianized 
Jew. The Mede, the Elamite, the Greek, the 
Roman. Indeed, take all of the Churches to- 
gether, as many, if not more, nations than 
were represented at Jerusalem on the Day of 
Pentecost. The Apostolic heralds were pro- 
claiming the Gospel everywhere, and the net 
was as full of divers kinds as in the vision of 
Peter. It is not surprising then that there 
should have been these disputations. The 
members, both Jew and Gentile, all held the 
Head ; they had been born into the Kingdom, 
but now, in going to work for their Lord, they 
could not agree. They need an Apostle to in- 
struct them. He comes, even Paul, and writes 
his Epistle to the Romans. He has proved to 
the Christians that salvation does not come by 



f 



16 ECCE REGNUM. 



the works of the law, but only through 
faith in Jesus Christ. Keeping to this 
doctrine, he disapproves of their strife about 
things indifferent, assuring them that the 
Kingdom of God is not meat and drink. In 
substance he expresses himself thus : You 
are disputing about the use of meats that have 
been offered to idols, about the wine that has 
been poured forth in libations to the gods. Are 
they fit for use or not % Some of you are Jews, 
and cannot do away with the distinction of 
meats ; you linger around the old sacrifices of 
the Temple worship. You love the Days of 
Pentecosts, the New Moons, the Feast of the 
Tabernacle, in fine — Judaism. 

Here is another party : You are Gentiles ; you 
know nothing about the rites and ceremonies of 
your Jewish brethren. Your eyes have been 
opened to see Jesus as the Christ ; He is your 
God now. You esteem all meats, all days alike. 
Well, brethren of both parties, you disagree. 
Have your way until you can learn more, but 
do not dispute, do not wrangle about these 
things. Receive each other. "Why dost thou 



RITUALISM. 



judge thy brother, for we must all stand before 
the judgment-seat of Christ." If you think 
your work can abide this test, keep on with it. 
As for myself, U I am persuaded that there is 
nothing unclean of itself, it is to every one as 
he esteemeth it." Do not be grieved with 
your brother. Walk charitably. Your meat 
is good and your wine is good. ' ' All things are 
indeed pure;" "but it is not good that you 
should cause your brother to stumble, or that 
you should make him weak. ' ' Exercise mutual 
forbearance and moderation toward each other. 
Destroy not him with thy meat for whom Christ 
died. Follow after the things that make for 
peace. These " doubtful disputations " do no 
good. "Hast thou faith, that is, art thou per- 
suaded for thyself in these matters ? Have it 
to yourself, that is, enjoy the comfort of it. 
Don't trouble others by an imprudent use of 
it; don't impose your rule arbitrarily .upon 
others ; our good should not be evil spoken of." 
So in this spirit he draws their minds away 
from dead forms to the Kingdom of Heaven, and 
would have them so tilled with righteousness 



18 ECCE REG NUM. 



peace and joy in the Holy Ghost, that sin and 
strife should cease among them. At one blow 
he breaks down the distinction between Juda- 
ism and Gentileism, and bids all the members 
of the Church find their life and happiness in 
Christ. 

The Kingdom o± Heaven first is his method. 

Has anything occurred in the constitution of 
human nature, or in the condition of society, 
that should lead us to adopt any other as of 
prime importance in promoting the good and 
happiness of mankind % Is not the Gospel of 
the Kingdom, now as ever, the wisdom of God 
and the power of God unto salvation ? And in 
this respect is there anything else that can take 
its place ? Can Ritualism ? Nay. The King- 
dom is not meat and drink. 



POLITICS. 

As formalism in worship is not the Kingdom 
of Heaven, neither is it any form of ecclesiasti- 
cal or civil government. It does not consist in 



POLITICS. 19 

Church or State policy or politics. There are 
some that are not inclined to make any distinc- 
tion between politics and religion. If there is 
none, we ought not certainly to make it. 
There was a man not fourteen years ago, 
who tried to unite a Congregationalist, Baptist 
and Methodist Church all in one organi? body ; 
this was to be more than an Evangelical Alli- 
ance, but his politics failed. Did he lose his 
religion? If he did, he ought not to preach. 
The fact is there is a distinction : it is one thing 
to be a good Methodist, Baptist or Congrega- 
tionalist, and another to be a Christian. It is 
one thing to be a zealous Democrat, Republi- 
can, Monarchist or Imperialist, and another to 
love the Lord Jesus Christ with all the heart, 
and our neighbor as ourselves. 

The point is this : Religion is of faith, and 
faith fastens upon the Son of God ; hence the 
distinction between the Kingdom of God and 
the kingdoms of this world. The latter are 
natural, formal, political and temporary, made 
of imperfect materials, even the " basest of 
men," and adapted to an imperfect, because 



20 ECCE REGNUM. 



sinful, state of society. While the Kingdom 
of God is essential, moral and spiritual, and, 
like God Himself, abides forever. The one is 
the husk, the other is the kernel ; one the 
form, the other the substance ; both are of 
God, but the chaff is designed to protect the 
wheat. The political is for the spiritual, and 
when it ceases to be of service it disappears. 
Do we not see, then, the distinction between 
the political and the spiritual, or politics and 
religion ? Can we live on forms of worship or 
forms of government? — on husks or chaff? 
ISTay, fain would a prodigal fill his belly with 
such trash, in his hunger, for something better ; 
but when he comes to himself he repents, and 
draws near to his father' s house, where there is 
bread enough and to spare. What is the chaff 
to the wheat ? he says, give me the kernel : 
formalism, eccles iasticism, politics— 1 must 
use them, but I can not live on them. I want 
religion. 

So we see the relation of forms of ecclesiasti- 
cal and civil government to the Kingdom of 
God. The powers that be are ordained of God 



POLITICS. 21 



for the protection of His people and the inter- 
ests of His Spiritual Kingdom, until He, Him- 
self, shall establish it visibly on this earth in 
glory. If those in authority would bear this in 
mind, they would be much assisted in the ad- 
ministration of government. They would not 
then undertake to do God's work, but their 
own in His fear. Looking upon society as it 
is, and not as it ought to be or will be when 
the Millenium comes, they would only attempt 
what is practicable and not what is impossible. 
They would not try to bring The Kingdom, but 
simply act with reference to it. It would be 
before them in all of its Spiritual light, as they 
saw it by faith in God' s Word, and they would 
pray that it might come, ascribing it with all 
power and glory unto the Lord. Expecting it 
supernaturally, they would strive politically 
only as they had the power, and having done 
their best for God and the people, with mate- 
rials imperfect by reason of the corruption of 
human nature, they would wait patiently for 
their Lord ; wait for the King of Kings to 
bring them their Heavenly Crown, and by so 



-4 



22 ECCE REGNUM. 



much as they valued this crown, we may be- 
lieve they would keep their hands from bribes 
and stand up for truth and justice.* 

Grod, then, has ordained Empires, Monarch- 
ies and Republics. Says Daniel: " The Most 
High ruleth in the kingdom of men, and giveth 
it to whomsoever He will. He setteth up over 
it the basest of men.' ' He set up wicked Nebu- 
chadnezzar over Babylon. "Thou, O King," 
he says, ' ' art a King of Kings, for the God 

* Here we may appropriately quote from an address delivered re- 
cently by Prof. W. G. Sumner, of Yale, before the Phi Beta Kappa 
Society, Brown University : "In this view the worst vice in political 
discussion is that dogmatism which takes its stand on great principles, 
or assumptions, instead of standing on an exact examination of things 
as they are, and human nature as it is. The commonest form of this 
error is that which arises from discontent with things as they are . An 
ideal is formed of some " higher " or " better " state of things than now 
exists, and almost unconsciously the ideal is assumed as already ex- 
isting, and made the basis of speculations which have no root. * * 
The Social Sciences are the stronghold of this pernicious dogmatism, 
and nowhere does it more harm than in politics. The whole method 
of abstract speculation on political topics is vicious. It is popular 
because it is easy. It is easier to imagine a new world than to learn 
to know this one. It is easier to embark on speculations, based 
upon a few broad assumptions, than it is to study the history of 
States and institutions. 1 ' Does not the fact that men form an ideal of 
a "higher or better state of things" give assurance that there is the 
reality somewhere, and is not the mistake in the fact that they expect 
the " better state " to come in this dispensation formally, politically, 
rather than i» another supernaturfclly ? Who is right, the Idealist 
or Realist ? There is a " better state, 11 but that only is realized in the 
Kingdom of Heaven. To bring this is God's work, not man's. The poli- 
tician's error is in supposing that it is his. 



POLITICS. 



23 



of Heaven hath given thee a Kingdom. Thou 
art the head of gold."* Then comes Media 
and Persia, Greece and Rome, and the Ten 
Kingdoms, part iron and part clay, that in 
some form are now in the earth. Did God put 
in place the Head and not arrange the rest of 
the image ? If He raised up the King of Baby- 
lon, did He not raise up Cyrus and Alexander, 
the Caesars, the Napoleons, and all of the kings 
and magistrates that have ever lived ? 

No one can deny it with any show of reason. 
But why does God give the people wicked ru- 
lers as well as good ones % Because they de- 
sire them. They will vote for them ten to one. 
There are very few godly persons in office com- 
paratively. In fact they do not seek for it. 
They wait until they are called ; and then like 
Moses, they fear to take the responsibility. 
They feel "who is sufficient for these things," 
and go only as of necessity — only to serve God 
and promote the best interests of the people ; 
and as they feel God is with them, can they be 
strong. It is in Him that they a/e like the he- 

* Danl. ii.,37. 



24 ECCE REGNUM. 



roes of old — like Gideon, Samson, Jephthah, 
David, Samuel and the Prophets, "who through 
faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteous- 
ness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of 
lions, quenched the violence of fire, escaped the 
edge of the sword, out of weakness were made 
strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight 
the armies of the aliens ; being destitute, afflict- 
ed, tormented, of whom the world was not wor- 
thy,"* Christian statesmen and rulers are much 
needed. Principles and not men is a false mot- 
to. Party and not truth is a deceptive and 
dangerous expedient. Able men and men that 
fear Jehovah the God of Israel, should hold 
the reins and occupy the seats of power and au- 
thority in the land ; so that the government be 
a blessing to the good, and a terror to the bad 
always, protect its friends and vanquish its 
enemies everywhere. Good government is a 
great blessing, the nations have always needed 
it, and it has ever been submitted to the choice 
of the people. Christ is King, and if they 
would accept Him and keep His comma nd- 

* Heb xi. 



POLITICS. 25 



ments, they would have it ; but this the people 
as nations never do. So far they have voted 
against God.' Israel of old, the chosen nation 
would get rid of the Theocracy and have a 
king ; and so God gave them one, Saul, the 
son of Kish. He gave them David also and 
Solomon ; and afterwards He rent the king- 
dom in twain. And why ? because the people 
would have it so. God let them do as they 
pleased ; He treated them as free moral agents. 
He treats everything according to its nature. 
Israel would worship other Gods, so He let 
them join themselves to their idols. The fact 
is they did not love to have Jehovah reign over 
them. They chose to forget what He had done 
for them, and rebel against Him. At last, 
when He sent His Son, they crucified Him. 
This was enough. The cup of vengeance was 
then full, and the chosen nation of God that 
had been nourished, as a mother would care for 
her child, must drink it to the dregs. Christ 
saw the sword of the Roman coming, and the 
abomination of desolation standing in the holy 
Temple, when one day standing upon 



26 ECCE REGNUM. 

Mount Olivet and looking upon the city 
from the sorrow of His great compassion- 
ate heart, weeping, He exclaimed, " Oh Jeru- 
salem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the pro- 
phets, and stonest them that were sent unto 
thee, how often would I have gathered thy 
children together, even as a hen gathereth her 
chickens under her wings, and ye would not"* 
Ye would not. "Ye will not come to me," 
says the Saviour, "that ye may have life." 
Does Jesus then weep and love us still when 
we will not ? If we were like Jesus, could not 
we weep over such hardness of heart ? Can God 
be blamed for punishing it ? Who can reason- 
ably find fault with Him for taking away from 
Israel their form of government and placing 
them under the feet of the Gentiles ? Did he 
not do right? and if the Gentile nations, or 
individuals, refuse to come under His mild 
and loving sceptre ; if they despise and re- 
ject the Son of God, will it not be right for 
Him to dash them in pieces like a pot- 
ter's vessel? Verily, shall not the Judge of 

* Matt, xxiii., 37. 



POLITICS. 27 



all the earth do right? "Be wise now, there- 
fore, oh ye kings ; be instructed, ye judges of 
the earth, kiss the Son lest he be angry, and ye 
perish from the way when His wrath is kin- 
dled but a little."* 

We would notice one point more, in this con- 
nection, to justify God's government over this 
world. The truth is, God gives the nations bet- 
ter forms of government than they deserve, and 
in placing the people of the United States un- 
der a comparatively free government, He has 
dealt with them in much mercy. We must 
consider that He is ruling over a revolted 
province of His dominions. At the founda- 
tion of the world He gave the dominion of this 
earth to man. Look at it then, shining in the 
beauty of Paradise, and all the Sons of God 
shouting over it for joy ! Adam, himself obe- 
dient to God, and all creation at his command, 
the fish of the sea, the fowl of the air, the cat- 
tle of the field, and everything that creep eth 
upon the earth all under his dominion. But, 
alas ! how changed the scene. Since Satan 

* 2d Psalm. 



ECCE REGNUM. 



usurped this kingdom, we see sin, death and 
the curse reigning from Adam until now. The 
whole Creation, in the expressive language oj: 
the Apostle, ' ' groaning and travailing in pain 
together ;' ' * man lost to God and himself, and 
the world in ruins. Certainly, this is not 
God' s work ; that which was pronounced good 
in the beginning. No. It is the work of the 
Great Destroyer, who is represented as go- 
ing about like a roaring lion, seeking whom 
he may devour. By lying he seduced the 
first pair, and snatched the beautiful king- 
dom from their grasp ; and ever since he has 
been the Prince of this world in a subordinate 
sense to be sure ; but no less really so. He is 
called "the Prince of the power of the air, the 
Spirit that worketh in the children of disobe- 
dience." f His name is legion, and followed by 
devils and wicked men, he would in his ram- 
pant rage against God and all righteousness de- 
stroy everything, if God himself did not still 
sit on the throne ; and by offsetting one form of 
evil against another, "cause his wrath to 

* Rom. vii., 22. t Eph. ii., 2. 



POLITICS. 29 



praise him, restraining the remainder thereof." 
Consider then what a province of evil and 
wickedness God has to deal with on this earth ; 
and in doing so, how can we judge Him severe 
in framing even the hardest form of govern- 
ment. A despotism, iron bondage, even when 
necessary to restrain sin, mitigate the curse, 
and protect His people that must live in the 
world until the time of their deliverance comes. 
So we see the necessity of the various forms of 
government that have existed, and still con- 
tinue to exist on the face of the earth. We 
see w T hat they are for. They are not The 
Kingdom, but they protect the saints, the 
heirs of The Kingdom, who would be entirely 
worn out if it was not for them. They enfold 
the Church of Christ as the shell holds the ker- 
nel. Sometimes it is the rough burr of despot- 
ism ; now the rigid shell of monarchy, then the 
loose husk of republicanism. At all events, 
these governments are formal and temporary ; 
and so, when they are no longer of use, they 
fall off like decaying leaves after a nipping frost 
or a pelting rain. 



30 ECCE REGNUM. 



i ' The voice said cry, and he said what shall I 
cry, all flesh is as grass, and the glory of man 
as the flower of grass, the grass withereth and 
the flower thereof falleth away." 



EEFOEMS. 

Again, as the Kingdom essentially is no form 
of worship or ecclesiastical or civil government, 
neither is it any educational, social or moral re- 
form. The liberty reform, the temperance, the 
women's rights, the labor reforms, and all 
others of the day are not it. 

The young man in the Gospel had kept all of 
the commandments from his youth up, that is, 
he was a moral young man. Yet there was one 
thing he lacked. Make all of the people moral 
after this pattern then, and there will be one 
thing wanting in the world. Reformation is 
not Regeneration. However desirable politi- 
cal liberty may be, yet, after we break every 
chain and give all men their rights in a free re- 
public, we have not freed them from the bond- 



RFFORMS. 31 



age of sin and brought them out into the liberty 
wherewith Christ maketh free, the liberty of 
the sons of God. There is such a thing as a 
people thinking more of their own rights than 
the rights of God. 

Let the women all vote, as it is said they do 
out in Wyoming, let them fill the places of men 
and do as men do, and have all of the rights 
they have ; any way as may seem most desire- 
able to those who make their cause a specialty, 
yet, we may doubt if such a state of things 
would be Heaven. Woman has her place, as 
man has his, and wherever reformers may put 
her, it will be still true that her most influential 
sphere is at home, the dearest spot on earth, an 
image of the Kingdom when filled with the 
heavenly spirit, but alas not it, for the family 
circle breaks: " friend after friend departs," 
the homestead perchance is sold, and the fond 
spot once cherished by parents and children 
knows us no more : 

" We've no abiding city here, 

We seek a city out of sight, 
Zion its name — the Lord is there, 

It shines with everlasting light.'' 



32 ECCE BEGNUM. 



Suppose, again, you adjust capital and labor 
so that their relations will be equal, and they 
work together like a good yoke of oxen. Tug- 
ging away at the wheels of industry, in factory 
and shop ; in the store, on the farm, in the 
street, along the highways and railroads. 
What is the result % Food and clothing, horses 
and carriages in good style, and enough of 
them. That is about all. But is this the 
Kingdom of Heaven % We enjoy such com- 
forts, and we would not be thrust back to the 
hardships of the Fathers, for we might suffer. 

We would vote for every laudable improve- 
ment and every wise measure for the distribu- 
tion of property and the abolition of poverty ; 
but at the same time, we must insist that ma- 
terial prosperity is not synonymous with the 
Kingdom of Heaven. Admit, for the sake of 
the argument, that all things are held in com- 
mon in Heaven. So Christ says that we shall be 
like the Angels there, and that there is no marry- 
ing or giving in marriage in that blessed abode. 
Does it follow that God's law for this imperfect 
and sinful state here, on the earth now, is the 



REFORMS. 33 



commune, celibacy, or free love ? As well might 
we expect to become like tlie angels, by adding 
wings to our bodies, as to bring the New Jeru- 
salem down to this world by such legislation. 
Never, as yet, have a people been found here, 
since Eden, virtuous enough to use such lib- 
erty without abusing it to their own destruc- 
tion ; and we hesitate not to say that they 
never will be found until the Kingdom comes. 
As things are, God has ordained the family, 
the Church, and the State ; and he expects 
men to live in these institutions according to 
law as revealed in nature, and in the Bible. 
If they live virtuously, that is, keep His com- 
mandments in love, He deals gently with them ; 
but if they turn the liberty He gives them into 
sinful license, break through wholesome re- 
straint and try to enter Paradise, by the de- 
vices of their own natural hearts, they meet with 
nothing but a flaming sword. They come un- 
der a severe despotism if they are not good 
enough to govern themselves. 

God's people have been found under every 
form of government. A free government is the 



34 ECCE REGNUM. 



most desirable, but if it cannot be obtained by 
the rise of legitimate means, all Christians have 
to do is to render unto Caesar the things that 
are Caesar' s, and unto God the things that are 
God's, where they are. They may suffer like 
the early Christians by so doing ; but if they 
suffer with Christ, they may have the assur- 
ance, and be consoled by the fact, that they 
shall reign with Him in His Kingdom. 

And this will be reward enough, "For I 
reckon," says the Apostle, "that the sufferings 
of this present time are not worthy to be com- 
pared with the glory that shall be revealed in 
us." 

Once more, educate the masses of the people, 
up to the highest standard in art, science, lit- 
erature, philosophy and theology, if you 
please. Yes, make them all highly educated 
ministers of the Gospel, men in whom shall be 
Ihe concentrated essence of all other profes- 
sions and trades ; so that they can do anything 
else as well as preach. Yet after all, according 
to the Apostle Paul, who was an educated 
man, they would be liable to be castaways. 



FORMALISM. 35 



It is one thing to have a good education, and 
another to keep the body under and rale the 
Spirit. It takes the grace of God to do this ; 
and the education of the natural man, howso- 
ever widely diffused^ is not ttic grace of God in 
the heart. It is not The Kingdom. 



FORMALISM.— The Temptation. 

The Kingdom is not then formal, in the sense 
of being a product of tho natural or carnal 
mind ; any rite of worship, any form of govern- 
ment, in Church or State, that God may have 
appointed, for the purpose of holding in check, 
the disorderly and sinful elements of this 
world, His rebellious province. Neither is it 
any scientific, moral, intellectual, or social re- 
form. It is not essentially made up of forms. 
It is not of this material, work it over into as 
many patterns or shapes as you please. For 
example: anciently, the Patriarchal gives place 
to the Mosaic, this to the simple pattern of the 



36 ECCE REGNUM. 



New Testament, which was used in Apostolic 
times. This, corrupted, turns to Romanism, 
upon which, follows the Reformation of the 
16th century, giving birth to a variety of Prot- 
estant shapes, as Lutheranism, Episcopacy, 
Presbyterianism, Methodism, Congregational- 
ism, etc. But none of these are the Kingdom 
of Heaven. Bring them all together, in this 
age of the world, in an Evangelical Alliance, or 
into one universal organic body reformed of all 
abuses, and let this spread itself through the 
earth, and this is not the Kingdom. As we have 
observed that the Kingdom is no form of civil 
government, so a despotism, a monarchy, a re- 
public, or a commune, will not answer to it. 
Call out the strongest man, call him Caesar, 
crown him Emperor, give him unlimited power, 
and let him extend it over the known world ; 
give this Emperor all ecclesiastical power, 
make him Pope of the Church, and let him sit 
in the temple of God as God, and still the 
prayer is not answered "thy Kingdom come." 
Break up this great imperialism, call in a 
Bourbon, crown him king, limit his power by 



t 



FORMALISM. 37 



parliament or assembly, and let him work and 
extend his conquests, and build up the nation. 
We will have more liberty, perhaps, but still it 
will not be the liberty of Christ. 

Again, let the people rise and free themselves 
from this monarchical administration, proclaim 
themselves independent and establish a demo- 
cratic republic ; let this system work, and then 
in view of all that has passed into history for 
the hundred years that measure the life of the 
government celebrate, and what have we ? A 
great country, stretching from the Northern 
Lakes to the Southern Gulf, from the Atlantic 
to the Pacific Coast, full of people, full of re- 
sources, carried up in point of greatness so 
that she stands the peer of any of the king- 
doms of the earth ; her ships sailing over every 
sea, her banner waiving in every breeze, and 
her prowess acknowledged by all the world. 
And nearly all of this since the days of Wash- 
ington and the fathers of the Republic. But, 
after all, this is not the Kingdom. While the 
people celebrate and their orators review the 
past, rejoice in the present and prophecy con- 



38 ECCE REGNUM. 



cerning the future, should they see in vision 
this great nation extending over the whole of 
North and South America, and Europe, Asia 
and Africa, and all the islands of the sea, 
modelled after the same form of government ; 
should they behold a universal republic re- 
formed in every conceivable way, by forces 
working through every avenue of improvement 
until the agricultural, educational, mechanical, 
commercial, social, moral, political, ecclesias- 
tical life bursting through all effete and de- 
cayed forms shall have diffused itself univer- 
sally ; clothing the world in a new dress 
of freedom, intelligence, happiness, and pros- 
perity that has never been equalled, in fact, 
since Eden, this would not be the Kingdom of 
Heaven. 

We look back six thousand years in the 
direction where some of our modern philoso- 
phers see nothing but forms of human life 
evolving from apes, and we behold a pair as 
they come fresh from the hand of God. They 
are created but a little lower than the angels ; 
they are crowned with glory, honor, and im- 



FORMALISM. S9 



mortality. Their port is erect, their faces 
heavenly ; God Himself dwells with them and 
is their God. We see them walking together 
with Him in the cool of the day, and they are 
not afraid, for they have not sinned. He is 
their strength and their joy, and they fear no 
evil. They love their God ; they draw near to 
Him. " Nearer my God to Thee" is their 
song, and they trust Him for everything ; He 
draws near to them, and His delight is in 
them. They are in a garden, they till it, but 
they do not get weary with labor. As they 
are holy and beautiful, so they are in a holy 
and beautiful place. Everything praises God. 
There is no Satan there ; no death, no sickness, 
no pain, no curse, nothing to hurt or destroy. 
Now this is no dream, but inspired history. 
It is not the phantasmagoria of the political 
reformer, over which is the trail of the serpent, 
the blight of sin, the reign of death, all of 
which must be removed before the Kingdom 
comes into its fulness, but it is divine glory, a 
Heaven on earth, a Kingdom from God to 
man. The Kingdom is not of thig world, as it 



40 ECCE REGNUM. 



is in its sinful and sin-cursed state. That which 
is born of the flesh is flesh, refine it, expand it, 
dress it as you will. Let us not mistake any 
development, refinement, or education of the 
natural man, or old sinful Adam, either on a 
limited or universal scale, for the Kingdom of 
Heaven, however beautiful or extensive it may 
be. Let us not mistake the form for the sub- 
stance. There is danger of this The ten- 
dency these days is to formalism, to rational- 
ism on the one hand and superstition on the 
other. As both are of nature, and therefore 
are forms of belief that are not essentially un- 
like, they can come together whenever occa- 
sion should require it. A little finesse in 
Church and State might bring them into one 
political body. Here is the temptation. 
The Church is in danger of being deceived in 
the direction of formalism. If there ever was 
a season when it needed to retire and be with 
Christ in prayer, it is now. It is with Him in 
the temptation and all of the Kingdoms of the 
earth are before it in their worldly splendor. 
Is not the Church to conquer them for Christ, 



FORMALISM. 41 



and when they are offered to it shall it not 
take them, even if it is obliged to yield some 
of its principles, bow a little and worship a 
trifle ? Shall they not be seized in the name of 
Christ, though there has to be an alliance with 
error, and if they are nominally for Christ, is 
not this enough ? Is not nominal Christianity 
as good as the genuine ? the form of godliness 
as good as the power? But what fellowship 
hath Christ with Belial ? The Holy Spirit tells 
us that Satan and Christ are opposed to each 
other. So the flesh and the spirit — the world 
and the Church. Satan's art consists in ex- 
ploding this idea to the end that he may mix 
them up somewhat, fuse them, and so spirit- 
ualize the world by secularizing the Church. 
In this way behold how the "gold becomes 
dim and the fine gold changed." See the re- 
sult of this eraft ! Satan made to look like 
God sitting in the temple of God, and God 
made to look like Satan ; the world made to 
look like the Church and the Church like the 
world. A Church without a Christ, a temple 
without the shekinah, " Ichabod written upon 



i 



42 ECCE REGNUM. 



its walls ;" religion a form and Satan laughing 
under it as a cloak. Is this the Kingdom of 
Heaven ? No, say all of those who see the 
devil in it. There is nothing to hnrt or de- 
stroy in all of God's holy mountain. 

Must we apologize for throwing our ink at his 
Satanic Majesty ? Luther threw his inkstand 
it is said ; he had so vivid an idea of him. Let 
us not be deceived ; he hides himself these 
days, and feign would make us believe that he 
has no existence. He ought, certainly, to be 
exposed by any one who can see him. 

He controls the course of this w^orld ; only he 
would have us call it the "Spirit of the Age /"* 
and in all of our movements keep up with it, 
and so be led by him. Would it not be well to 
stop occasionally long enough to see who is 
leading us % Solomon gives good advice when 
he tells us "to ponder the path of our feet, 
that all our ways may be ordered aright." We 
may know the Devil ; he works in the children 
of disobedience, and his manner is crafty. He 
lies, he flatters, he deceives. At times he trans- 
forms himself into an angel of light. His 



FORMALISM. 43 



words are as smooth as butter ; but hatred is in 
his heart. He is cold, intellectual, brilliant, 
supple, and slimy or fierce, hot, dark and vin- 
dictive. He is always destructive. What he 
cannot destroy outright, he corrupts by his poi- 
son, and warily bides his time. 

He counterfeits the truth and palms his 
sham off for the genuine. The things men 
seek : life, liberty, happiness, glory, he gives 
them, but without Christ, so they only have a 
name to live to be free and be happy. They 
get the shadow and not the substance. A for- 
mal image of the Kingdom of God, ecclesiasti- 
cal, political, ritualistic, or rationalistic, but not 
the Kingdom itself. So the Church is tem- 
pted, the brethren are accused, superstitions, 
rites, corrupt religions, infidel principles, sub- 
tle heresies, and troublesome schisms abound ; 
the unholy passions of men are stirred, and 
there is anarchy and confusion everywhere. If 
there is peace for a time, it is but that of the 
calm before a storm, "that rises dark on the 
way." There is no peace saitli my God to the 
wicked. The Devil never gives it under his ad- 



44 ECCE REGNUM. 



ministration ; lie is the greatest agitator in so- 
ciety, and will never let things rest on perma- 
nent and sure foundations. 

It may not be popular these days, to say any- 
thing about Satan seriously ; but what if it is 
not, it is always safe to follow Scripture and 
call things by their right names. 

The example of the Apostle Paul, who 
speaks by inspiration of God, is to the point 
here. 

As he sees the Great Adversary of men, go- 
ing about, he warns Christians, and tells 
them to be strong ; strong in the Lord, and in 
the power of His might ; to put on the whole 
armor of God ; that they may be able to stand 
against the wiles of the Devil. For, says he, 
- ' we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but 
against principalities and powers ; against the 
rulers of the darkness of this world, against 
spiritual wickedness in high places ; wherefore 
take unto you the whole armor of God ; that 
ye may be able to withstand in the evil day ; 
and having done all, to stand."* 

* Eph. 6., 12-13. 



FORMALISM. 45 



" Stand up, my Soul, shake off thy fears, 
And gird the Gospel armor on : 
March to the gates of endless joy, 
Where Jesas, thy great Captain's gone. 

Hell and thy sins resist thy course ; 

But Hell and Sin are vanquished foes : 
Thy Jesus nailed them to the cross, 

And sung the triumph when He rose. 

Then let my Soul march boldly on — 
Press forward to the heavenly gate ; 

There peace, and joy eternal reign, 
And glittering robes for conquerors wait. 

There shall I wear a starry crown ; 

And triumph in Almighty grace ; 
While all the armies of the skies, 

Join in my glorious Leader's praise- 



PART II. 



Positively. 



THE KINGDOM UNFOLDED. 

Summarily.— The Kingdom of 

God is not of this world. It is 
not of the old nature after Adam, 
and is not seen in unregenerate 
persons, principles, laws or institu- 
tions. 

What is it then, is now our inquiry ? 

We go to God for an answer, and we find its 

nature and glory hid in the definition given us 

by the Apostle Paul ; hidden as the oak is 

concealed in the acorn. It but remains for us 




POSITIVELY. 47 

to watch its growth until it becomes manifest 
objectively in the Kingdom come, for this is 
what we are seeking. This is for what we pray 
when we say the Lord's Prayer. Positively, 
then, the Kingdom of God is certain principles 
in the Holy Ghost. 

It is something peculiar, " righteousness, joy 
and peace in the Holy Ghost" or God, for the 
Holy Ghost is God, a person and not simply an 
influence. We go to God for these principles, 
then ; He is the fountain of them ; they come 
down from Him ; thus the Kingdom coming 
from above is supernatural and heavenly in 
its origin. It does not start from the natural 
heart of man, is not born of his will or of the 
will of the flesh, but of God. The New Jeru- 
salem comes down to the soul, and is revealed 
within it ; so that at times love is shed abroad, 
righteousness is like a river, joy is full and 
peace passeth understanding.* The Kingdom 
is, therefore, a revelation to the believer. We 
do not think it out or reason it out, but we 
receive it by faith in the simplicity of a little 

♦Gal. 5. 



48 ECCE REGNUM. 



child, and as faith is the gift of God, being one 
of the heavenly principles, so the whole reve- 
lation is a gift, that is of grace, and being re- 
ceived into the soul it is within ns. Like a 
well of water it is within springing up into 
everlasting life. 

The Kingdom is a life, then. It is called a 
new life, eternal life, salvation. The begin- 
ning of it is called a new birth. It is an infant, 
as it were, a seed or principle, the beginning 
of something to be developed, the earnest of 
something to come. It is a grovjth, therefore, 
something future as in the flower as well as 
present in the seed, "First the blade, then 
the ear, and then the full corn in the ear," 
Now a handful of corn in the mountain- top, 
then a glory as of Lebanon. The something 
future is not the seed, but the flower that is 
enfolded in the seed, and which, through 
development, shall bloom. It is the mant/es- 
tation of what is hid within ; it is the glory, 
the redemption, in all of its parts, soul, body, 
creation manifest before all the worlds. "For 
I reckon," says the Apostle, as by the Spirit 



POSITIVELY. 49 



he looks forward, "that the sufferings of this 
present time are not worthy to be compared 
with the glory which shall be revealed in us, 
for the earnest expectation of the creature 
waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of 
God," and this glory, this redemption, is the 
redemption of the body, and of the whole 
creation from the bondage of corruption. It 
is what the Prophet Isaiah and the Apostles 
Peter and John see and call the "new heavens 
and the new earth, wherein dwelleth right- 
eousness." 

So the Kingdom comes in the supernatural 
power and glory of the regeneration and resur- 
rection ; the power and glory that is ascribed 
to the Father, and that with Him has existed 
from all eternity ; the power and glory of the 
Son who was with the Father before the world 
was, and of the Holy Spirit who proceeds from 
the Father and the Son. The Kingdom, then, 
is of the Godhead essentially as to nature as 
in essence the three persons are one. Its 
nature and glory are divine, and if, according 
to the Apostle, it is righteousness, joy and 



50 ECCE REGNUM. 



peace, it is all these in Father and Son as well 
as in the Holy Ghost. 
If a handful of corn can appear in the glory 
of harvest, why may not these divine princi- 
ples that are seen in the Godhead develope 
into the Kingdom of God % That they are the 
Kingdom is true as the seed is in the fruit, that 
is they are of the same nature. If any one 
pleases to call these principles fruit instead of 
seed, fruits of the Spirit, he can do so and be 
true ; still, we are not robbed of our seed, for 
the fruit-tree yields fruit whose seed is in it- 
self. We never ate an apple yet but that we 
found seed as well as meat, and though not 
formally, yet essentially, they were the same, 
and one of as much consequence as the other. 

As The Kingdom through a process of devel- 
opment comes to flower, we have an object be- 
fore us that we can look at. "We can behold 
its peculiar nature, and glory in a supernatur- 
al, spiritual, holy, peaceful light. 

We can see it standing out objectively, as in 
a mirror. Seen in this way, it is righteous- 
ness, joy and peace ; but it is more. It is the 



FORMALISM. 51 



Brightness of the Father' s glory. As it centers 
in Christ, a person is revealed, — the God-man. 
The divine veiled in the human, and shining 
through it, gives a light of supernatural splen- 
dor. To the spiritual mind, the heavens de- 
clare it ; day unto day utters it ; night unto 
night showeth it. Sun, moon and stars, and 
all the glories of the sky. The broad earth, the 
great ocean, the everlasting hills, the mind of 
man with all of his God-like powers image it ; 
but they are not it, any more than the pictures 
of father or mother, brother or sister, that we 
hang upon the walls of our chamber, are fa- 
ther or mother, brother or sister. We must 
not mistake nature for God ; the image for 
substance, the sentiments, ideas and opinions 
of the natural unregenerate heart, for the prin- 
ciples and fruits of the Holy Ghost. The 
glory of God is above nature ; it shines in the 
face of Jesus Christ, and as we behold it, we 
u are changed into the same image," says the 
Apostle, u from glory to glory, even as by the 
Spirit of the Lord."* And so we are made 



* 2 Cor. 3, 18. 



52 ECCE REGNUM. 



partakers of the Divine nature. We do not be- 
come identical with the Godhead ; but we find 
all that is essential to make us sons of God, 
and heirs of His Kingdom ; we are created 
anew in Christ, changed into the image of God, 
which consists in righteousness and true holi- 
ness. And so we are brought back to Paradise. 
Wonderful ! Wonderful ! Well might the 
disciples desire to build tabernacles at the foot 
of the Mount, as they beheld the glory of God 
shining in the face of Jesus Christ, and upon 
the risen and glorified saints that stood by. 
And what a confirmation of the divinity of 
Christ, to the essential oneness of the Father 
and the Son, are the words of the Father 
when He says, "This is my beloved Son, in 
whom I am well pleased. Hear ye Him." So in 
light we*see light. We behold the King in His 
beauty, and we see the Kingdom to be a pecu- 
liar, vital, heavenly, mysterious, spiritual, glo- 
rious, objective reality. A revelation or mani- 
festation of God in Christ, and the saints or 
sons of God in glory. A glory and a fulness 
that in Christ is all and in all. We see this 



THE TRANSFIGURATION. 53 

by faith. ; and are made better by looking. 
We are informed and transformed ; renewed 
and restored in Christ Jesus ; and in Him, as 
the second Adam, redeemed finally body and 
soul, and brought back to Eden. 



THE TRANSFIGURATION 

We hesitate not to say, tliat nothing short of 
an Eden glory can satisfy the soul of the be- 
liever in its most spiritual frames as the King- 
dom of God, but we have been brought to see 
it in Jesus, on the Mount. It is good for us 
to be here, let us tarry a while longer, for the 
vision is a revelation of the Kingdom. If we 
keep it before us, we can see it, and thus shall 
be able, to learn more concerning it. 

In the ninth chapter of Luke, Christ has His 
disciples with Him, and is giving them instruc- 
tion. ' ' And He said unto them, verily, I say 
unto you, that there be some of them that 
stand here, which shall not taste of death till 



54 ECCE EEONUM. 



they have seen the Kingdom of God come with 
power." 

Now, did any of the disciples see it, before 
they died % Tes, a few days after the Lord took 
Peter, James and John np into the Mount and 
showed it to them, and what did they see? 
We answer, a visible glory — glory within and 
glory all around — a spiritual, heavenly light, 
white and glistening, white as the snow. This 
is of Heaven, though on the earth. It is a 
revelation of the saints with their King in 
glory ; it is the Kingdom of Heaven, not in its 
widest extent as it shall fill the whole earth, 
but an epitome thereof ; true as far as it goes, 
and an earnest of what is to come when the 
prayer is answered, "Thy Kingdom come, Thy 
will be done on earth as it is in Heaven." 

Some raise an objection here, and say that 
we have not sufficient evidence that the trans- 
figuration was the Kingdom. Where, then, 
did the Disciples see it before they died ? 

They had glimpses of Christ' s royal majesty, 
but not to the extent of this vision. In this 
certainly was the King in His majesty. Peter 



THE TRANSFIGURATION. 55 

calls it majesty. Here was power and glory 
supernatural and divine, the same peculiarity 
that constitutes the nature of the Kingdom and 
distinguishes it from the Kingdoms of this 
world. The Kingdom was to come with power, 
and here on the Mount we see it put forth. 

Moreover, this view of the Kingdom is given 
in close connection with the promise that they 
should see it. At the longest it was only 
eight days after, and, therefore, was a speedy 
fulfillment of it. Christ delayed not, but 
hastened to make good His word and bless His 
Disciples. 

There were some that did really see the 
Kingdom ; from the manner in which Christ 
addressed those present we should infer that 
all would not before they died. So the event 
proved ; Peter, James and John being the privi- 
leged ones. This view, it seems to us, clearly 
explains the words of Christ. It is not all 
that should see the Kingdom, but some in 
distinction from others. Again, a visible reve- 
lation of the Kingdom to His Disciples was in 
the line of His ministrations. The main pur- 



56 ECCE REG NUM. 



pose of a man' s life indicates, to some extent, 
at least, the character of all his actions. 

Now, what was Christ doing ? Preaching 
the Gospel of the Kingdom ; proclaiming the 
glad tidings of it. This was His great work as 
a teacher ; it was for this that He wrought His 
miracles and gave His parables. As a priest 
He offered Himself a sacrifice to bring men 
into it. For what other purpose, then, could 
have been the transfiguration ? 

Surely it must have occurred to instruct His 
Disciples about the nature and glory of His 
Kingdom. And why is it not on record for 
our instruction in this respect? We have 
noticed that Peter, one of the witnesses, refers 
to it. In his Second Epistle he speaks of him- 
self as about to put off his earthly tabernacle. 

The glorified state, then, would naturally be 
before him. We find that it is, for he refers 
to it as the power and coming of the Lord as 
he sees it on the Mount. In making this 
known he says that they had not followed 
cunningly devised fables, but were eye-wit- 
nesses of His majesty. "For He" — Christ — 



THE TRANSFIGURATION. 57 

" received from God the Father honor and 
glory, when there came snch a voice from the 
Excellent glory : This is My Beloved Son, in 
whom I am well pleased. And this voice, which 
came f:om Heaven, we heard when we were 
with Him in the holy Mount. "* What does 
the Apostle here testify to if it is not to the 
King in His Kingdom % 

What does the " majesty" reveal, if not a 
certain sweetness, grace and glory that is 
heavenly and regal ? 

"Majestic sweetness sits enthroned 
Upon the Saviour's brow, 
His head with radiant glories crowned, 
His lips with grace o'erflow." 

Do we not see the majesty, taste and sweet- 
ness, behold the glories, feel the grace \ 

But Christ is not alone. Moses and Elijah 
are there in their glorified bodies. And do 
not they look like Mugs and priests with 
Christ % and those Disciples at the foot of the 
Mount, are they not men in the flesh, Jews ? 
and the territory, is it not the earth ? So that 

* 2 Peter i, 17, 18. 



58 ECCE BEGNUM. 



so far as the glory extends the prayer is an- 
swered, "Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be 
done on earth as it is in Heaven." Must our 
eyes be holden that we cannot see % It is 
noticeable that Christ had gone up into the 
mountain for prayer, and that while there the 
Disciples went to sleep. Is it because Chris- 
tians are asleep now that they do not see % Let 
them awake and behold the light of the know- 
ledge of the glory of God as it shines in the 
face of Jesus Christ. Faith is sight here. 
Only believe, said Jesus to Martha, on another 
occasion than the Transfiguration, ' ' Said I not 
unto thee that if thou wouldest believe thou 
shouldst see the glory of Gfod V ' * Once believe 
that the Transfiguration was the Kingdom of 
God, and it is very easy to determine what the 
Kingdom is. We must see in this light that it 
is not only a principle of eternal life within the 
soul, wrought by the spirit of God, and manifest 
to ourselves and to others in all of the fruits 
of the spirit, as righteousness, joy and peace, 
but it is an objective, spiritual reality, a state 

* John xi, 40. 



THE TRANSFIGURATION. 59 

of glory on the earth, where Christ and the 
saints, and the earth, and the Disciples, at the 
foot of the Mount, shine in divine splendor. 

It is a Christophony, an Epiphany 
A glorious appearing of living persons. 

Now, do we read of anything in the Bible like 
this, that is to be in the future, and if so, is it 
not the Kingdom of God manifest on this earth. 
The transfiguration was the Kingdom, not a re- 
presentation picture or symbol of it, but the 
Kingdom itself. There is a difference as respects 
a picture and its original, as between form and 
substance. 

Is there to be found in the Scriptures, an- 
other scene described which, when it shall come, 
shall be like this on the Mount, and therefore, 
the Kingdom of God also. We shall see as we 
advance. 



THE LIGHT OF PROPHECY. 

In looking at the Apostle Peter's writings, 
we observe that in addition to his testimony to 



r 



60 ECCE REGNUM. 



the Transfiguration, lie speaks of the sure word 
of prophecy, which he compares to a light. 
" We have," he says, "the more sure word of 
prophecy, whereunto ye do well, that ye take 
heed as unto a light that shineth in a dark 
place, until the day dawn and the day-star 
arise in your hearts, knowing this, that no 
prophecy of the Scripture is of any private in- 
terpretation. For the prophecy came not in 
old time by the will of man, but holy men of 
God spake as they were moved by the Holy 
Ghost."* Prophecy unfulfilled has reference 
to the future, and if it is true certainly ought 
to be heeded. That the prophecy Peter refeis 
to is true, he infers from the fact that it comes 
from God and not from man. It is not of 
man's reason, but from the Holy Ghost. It 
is not natural, like thunder in the sky, but 
supernatural, like the voice from the Excel- 
lent glory. It is not the private views of the 
holy men that spake, but the pure white truth 
of God breathed into and through them. It is 
no mere system of human speculation or pliilo- 

* 2 Peter, i, 19-20. 



THE LIGHT OF PROPHECY. 



61 



sophy spun like the web of the spider from its 
own bowels, but a divine revelation from above, 
which the Prophets, even, did not fully under- 
stand themselves. The prophecy of the Scrip- 
ture referred to by the Apostle no doubt has 
reference to the writings of the Old Testament. 
These come down to us through holy men 
from God to be as a light to us in this dark 
and evil world until a glorious day dawns and 
a bright and morning star appears, in the light 
of which we shall need no lamp of Scripture to 
our feet. " For," now, " we know in part and 
we prophesy in part. But when that which is 
perfect is come, then that which is in part 
shall be done away." "For now we see 
through a glass darkly, but then face to face." 

Holding, then, the Scriptures in our hands 
as we journey, we have a mirror upon which 
the Spirit shines "and brings the truth to 
light," spiritual truth — supernatural, "the 
knowledge of the glory of God as it shines in 
the face of Jesus Christ." . 

"To Him give all of the Prophets witness," 
says Peter to Cornelius, i 'that through His name 



62 ECCE REGNUM. 



whosoever believeth on Him shall receive re- 
mission of sins." It is of this salvation we 
are told that these prophets inquired, " search- 
ing what, or what manner of time the Spirit of 
Christ which was in them did signify when 
it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ 
and the glories that should follow." Christ, 
then, in His sufferings and glories was the ob- 
ject before the Prophets as by the Spirit they 
testified. 

By supernatural inspiration they spake of 
this Divine Person. The light that reached 
their eyes from the distant future came from 
Him. So we see that it is the supernatural 
element in connection with the person of Jesus 
that explains the meaning of the Scriptures. 
If this is ignored or misapprehended they are 
a riddle, and become a mere plaything in the 
hands of speculative sophists, who ever and 
anon, as please the fancy, turn things to 
images, legends, allegories or myths. 

It is a common saying that we need the Holy 
Spirit that we may understand Scripture ; that 
we must be led by the Spirit if we would 



THE LIGHT OF PROPHECY, 63 

know the truth. But what is the Spirit but 
the supernatural? What is it but an appre- 
hension, vital and real, of the supernatural in 
the letter and form revealing to us objective 
facts ? And what is formalism but the letter 
or form without the supernatural. Take away 
the supernatural, then, out of the Bible, and 
you destroy the very spirit and life of it. It 
is not God' s word, then ; therefore it is any- 
thing any one may please to make it ; at best 
a treatise on natural religion. It may stand 
beside the works of Confucius and others, 
but as to being a revelation from Heaven 
to man of power to raise him to glory, it 
fails. 

But the supernatural element cannot be 
eliminated from Scripture. It is there, whether 
men will believe it or not, and there it will re- 
main as the word of God, which shall abide 
forever. The writings may pass away, but the 
supernatural truth as it is in Jesus shall become 
more manifest as revelation succeeds revela- 
tion, until all is fulfilled in Him. 

This is the light of Prophecy, a supernatural, 



64 ECCE REGNUM. 



spiritual, heavenly light, even as of the Holy 
Ghost. 

Not only is the supernatural the light of the 
Old Testament^ but it shines with even greater 
splendor in the New. It unites the two dis- 
pensations as sunlight joins morning and noon. 
Hidden in the predictions, types, shadows, 
covenants, ceremonies and commandments of 
the Old, it becomes manifested in the super- 
natural events connected with the Lord Jesus 
Christ, as His Incarnation, Transfiguration, 
Crucifixion, Resurrection, Ascension. And 
is there anything more that has not been re- 
vealed, as yet, like His Second Advent, it be- 
longs to the supernatural. This is the light 
inaccessible, ineffable, that, with the God- 
head, has existed from all eternity, which no 
man can approach unto in its unveiled essence 
and live, yet as a ray from Heaven at dawn, it 
appears in the early record, and advances until 
it illuminates the entire sacred page. It is 
this that shines upon us at Creation in the 
glory of Eden, and which, though obscured by 
the fall, rises again in the narrative given us 



THE LIGHT OF HISTORY. 65 

of God's chosen people, until it appears in 
Jesus Christ. It leads the inquiring soul to 
Him as did the Star in the East the Persian 
Magi. It stands over his cradle, follows Him 
in His ministry, mingles with His sufferings in 
G-ethsemene and in the dying agonies of the 
Cross, rises with Him from the grave, and as- 
cends with Him to Heaven where all is light. 
It comes in the out-pouring of the Spirit to the 
souls of men, according to the Saviour's promise 
that He would send the Comforter. And yet 
once more revealing the person of Jesus de- 
scending as He ascended in the clouds of 
Heaven in the glory of His Father, and all 
the Holy Angels it comes, comes down to 
earth. Then 

w Let every creature rise and bring 
Peculiar honors to our King ; 
Angels descend with songs again, 
And earth repeat the loud Amen." 



THE LIGHT OF HISTORY. 

Prophecy is a unit, though divided into two 
parts, fulfilled and unfulfilled. That which is 



ECCE REGNUM. 



fulfilled is History, This has come from the 
realm of faith into sight, and has become ob- 
jective in the record of this world's move- 
ments. No fable, allegory, romance, dream or 
myth is History, but rather veritable sub- 
stance, literal fact with which men and na- 
tions have had something to do. 

It is even the record of their very life, the 
real truth concerning them more wonderful 
than all of the heights or depths of human 
speculation ; stranger than all the loftiest soar- 
ings of the most excited imagination. Fictious, 
romancing and poetical inspiration spread their 
wings of wax, and we are borne along the 
clouds in the most attenuated ether ; but as in 
the fable the wings melt, and we find a decen- 
sus, if not to the Great Elsewhere as some one 
has called Hell, yet to the Great Nowhere, 
where Nihilism reigns. 

Who is more bewildered than he who lives 
in the regions of fancy ? On the other hand, 
who has more light than he who reads the His- 
tory of this World, and sees the supernatural, 
that is, God in it % Sees Christ, the beginning, 



THE LIGHT OF HISTORY. 



67 



middle, and end of it ; He, the Alpha and 
Omega as He is revealed, is its light. He is 
the light of the world ; we have no light with- 
out Him. The past, the present, and the fu- 
ture center in Him, ' ' for of Him, through Him, 
and to Him are all things." By Him all things 
were made, for Him they all exist, and to Him 
everything moves. History, like prophecy, 
then, is a revelation of the supernatural, God 
is in it, and in its light. Primarily and essen- 
tially, all of its events existed in His mind, and 
now as they stand out in the past, they are to 
be viewed as having reference to some plan of 
His with respect to this lost and ruined world, 
viz. : the Plan of Redemption through Jesus 
Christ. 

No one can be a competent historian, not even 
an intelligent reader of history who discards 
this plan for it reveals the design of God. 

A wise master-builder makes his plan before- 
hand, and puts it upon record. He then col- 
lects the materials that are to go into his build- 
ing. As the stone, wood, iron and brick, lie 
scattered about, the casual observer represent- 



ECCE REGNUM. 



ing some historians sees nothing but confusion, 
without making any further inquiry, he de- 
scribes what he sees, and lo ! he gives us con- 
fusion in his writings. The reader not satisfied 
with his book, asks what are the materials for, 
so he writes again, and after a closer examin- 
ation pronounces the design a building ; but 
not being acquainted with the architect, he 
draws on his imagination for the plan. He 
gives us what he fancies it is to be, when the 
materials are arranged. We may take the 
thing of fancy and publish it as the true. How- 
ever, it is the master's plan that will make 
manifest, or the building as according to this 
plan, it rises from its foundation, that will re- 
veal the truth. So, indeed, history shows us a 
supernatural heavenly temple rising. The 
builder, God. The plan, the Scriptures, the 
materials in the earth. As the plan reveals the 
building, and vice versa, the building, the plan, 
so does the Scripture and genuine history 
mutually fulfill and interpret each other. 

The question of Scripture Interpretation, 
therefore, is settled in this light. It is the 



THE LIGHT OF HISTORY. 



supernatural or spiritual, historical or literal 
method, that is the true as opposed to the fig- 
urative and mystical, not the spiritual as 
opposed to the literal, as many writers put it, 
but the spiritual as opposed to the imaginative. 
The thing as opposed to its image, the genuine 
as opposed to the counterfeit, the true as op- 
posed to the false. Do we understand what the 
term spiritual really implies, when we use it ? 
Properly, it has reference to the Holy Spirit, 
to the mind of God, as revealed in the Scrip- 
tures ; therefore, to the supernatural as dis- 
tinguished from the natural ; to the new man 
in Christ as distinguished from the old man in 
Adam. The two natures, the spirit and the 
flesh, which are in opposition, explain its true 
use. In the light of these we see that the 
spiritual is not opposed to the literal, but 
rather to the natural, the imaginations of the 
flesh or Adamic nature. The glow of an ex- 
cited imagination is not the inspiration of the 
Spirit. The fanciful hypothesis of visionary 
thinkers is not the word of God. To the law 
and the testimony, then, as supernaturally re- 



T 



70 



ECCE REGNUM. 



vealed and historically interpreted, and not to 
" wizards that mutter and peep," and with rods 
of their own and incantation that is not prayer 
call up from the " vasty deep" of their own 
souls, or dead men's souls, "red spirits and 
white, dark spirits and gray," and call them- 
selves spiritual. 

Spiritual means Holy Ghost. Could we 
always be satisfied with His words in their 
simplicity, the book that we should love the 
best would be the Bible — the learning that we 
should prize the most would be that which 
would give us a knowledge of its meaning, 
and the preaching that would please us the 
most would be the sound exposition, with the 
apposite application, instead of the sensational 
inflated verbose arranged to gratify an itching 
ear, and make the people stare. Peter preached 
a very plain sermon on the day of Pentecost 
in the words of the Holy Ghost. It was made 
up largely of quotations from the old Testa- 
ment, and simply revealed the fact to the Jews 
that they had crucified the Messiah. 

David is sent against the Philistines, who 



THE LIGHT OF HISTORY. 



71 



conquers them by slaying their leader 'Goliath, 
of Gath, with a sling and a stone. Peter is an 
uneducated fisherman, David is a shepherd 
and a stripling, but the Spirit that uses ap- 
parently feeble instrumentalities in the pulling 
down of strong holds, is seen to be mighty. 
"It is not by might or by power, but by my 
spirit saith the Lord." So the glory is to God, 
and we see the spiritual to be the real, even 
like the historical, and instead, therefore, of 
being opposed to the literal events of history, 
is directly or indirectly the power that pro- 
duces them. To oppose, then, the spiritual to 
the literal is a wrong use of*terms, for they are 
identical in all the facts of sacred history. To 
oppose the spiritual to 'the natural, to the im- 
aginative, speculative, and figurative ideas of 
men is a correct use of language, for there is no 
divine spirit or life in the dead forms or 
images, that are conjured up in their brains, 
indeed, as they belong to the old nature, they 
are at enmity with the Holy Spirit, and it is the 
holy that is the truly spiritual. The spiritual, 
as to its nature, is just as literal, and therefore, 



Y2 ECCE EEGNUM. 



as real a thing as the natural. Christ though 
a supernatural person was a literal historical 
character. The new nature in the Christian 
though hidden with Christ in God, and which 
is found at the second birth is as real a life as 
that of the flesh, which conies at the first. Be- 
cause a person or a thing, or an experience, is 
spiritual, and at times out of sight, as is the 
flower while enclosed in the seed, it does not 
follow that it is not real, and is to be sometime 
in the letter and in history. We are often ob- 
liged to wait for things to grow before we see 
them. So it is with history, and it is here that 
the light we have followed, reveals to us the 
Philosophy of History * 

This, we are told, by one of our ablest theolo- 
gians, is "development" But everything 
developes itself, according to its own nature.. 
Wheat is wheat, tares are tares. That which is 
born of the spirit is spirit, and that which is 
born of the flesh is flesh, and they never cross 
from one to the other by any natural law ; tares 
never become wheat, flesh never becomes 

:: "Philosophy of History."— W. G. T. Shedd, D.D. 



THE LIGHT OF HISTORY. 73 

spirit, unless by the destruction of their vital 
principle, and the clothing of a new body, that 
is a new creation. Indeed, the destruction of 
the one is the life of the other. There is, there- 
fore, another law to be taken into considera- 
tion in the study of history, namely, that of 
death or decay. If we have rise and progress ', 
we also have death, this comes in upon the law 
of development, and says, thus far shalt thou 
go and no further, and then dissolution takes 
place, and so if there is an advance it is by a 
new creation. 

But God alone can create, therefore above, 
before and in all law is the agency of a per- 
sonal God. The laws of development and de- 
struction are but the mode of his operations. 

He starts things supernaturally, he causes 
them to grow according to nature, and for good 
reasons he destroys either naturally or super- 
naturally. 

Certain it is, as we trace his operations in the 
past, that he has supernaturally intervened. 
He has stopped progress by supernatural judg- 
ments as in the case of the antediluvians and 



74 ECCE EEGNUM. 



Sodomites, and he has arrested decay by the re- 
surrection of dead bodies. We have examples 
enough in history to convince any reasonable 
soul, that there is a personal God who lives dis- 
tinct from His works, and governs without 
being confined exclusively to any particular 
method. History has made progress, if at all, 
supernaturally, not simply, and alone through 
nature. So we see that the light of history as 
to philosophy, as well as interpretation, is the 
supernatural. 

As in the past so in the future, therefore, we 
may expect that God will interpose super- 
naturally and literally in the accomplishment 
of His plan of redemption ; that perfection will 
only come through destructions and new crea- 
tions, that the age of miracles has not yet pass- 
ed, and that the kingdom of God when it comes 
will be ushered in by supernatural judgments, 
and displays of divine power, that shall destroy 
the old, and bring in a new order of things 
that may properly be styled a new creation. 
And is it too much to assume that this expec- 
tation is clearly confirmed by the teachings of 



THE LIGHT OF HISTORY. 



75 



the Bible? Nay, read the eighth of Romans, 
and mark the "earnest expectation" of the 
groaning and travailing creation, that lies un- 
der death and the curse. What is it, but a 
waiting for deliverance from the bondage of 
corruption for the redemption of the body, and 
the manifestation of the sons of God ? God 
shook the earth once at Sinai, and yet, "once 
more" He will shake not the earth only but 
heaven, and this world, yet once more says the 
Apostle, "signifieth the removing of those 
things that are or may be shaken, that those 
things which cannot be shaken may remain. 
Wherefore, we receiving a kingdom that can- 
not be moved, let us have grace w^hereby we 
may serve God with reverence and godly fear. 
For our God is a consuming fire."* 

Give us, then, for our torch, as we seek for 
the Kingdom the supernatural or spiritual, 
historical or literal method of interpretation, 
and that philosophy that always recognizes the 
personal God Jehovah as near and not afar 
off, and who wondrously working after the 

* Heb. 12, 27-28, 



76 ECCE REGNUM. 



counsel of His own will is ever bringing to 
light the hidden things that are not yet nntil 
all is fulfilled in Christ the Prophet, Priest 
and King of the world. Then with the King 
comes the Kingdom, answerable in glory to 
that seen on the Mount, spiritual, yet literal 
on the earth. To such a Kingdom patriarchs, 
prophets, apostles, martyrs, and holy men of 
all ages have testified. The sufferings of 
Christ and the glories that should follow were 
before the worthies of the Old Testament dis- 
pensation as the polar star is before the mari- 
ner at sea. The former has become history, 
while the latter, which has been partially re- 
vealed in the Transfiguration, is to be more 
fully manifest at the Second Advent, when the 
Lord shall come in the glory of His Father and 
of the holy angels." Who is this King of 
Glory ? The Lord of Hosts He is the King of 
Glory. 

Christ is King. The Kingdom of God we" 
are seeking is the Kingdom of Christ. As He 
came to this earth supernaturally and literally 
to suffer, so in like manner He is to come to 






THE LIGHT OF HISTORY. 



reign, come in glory, even as He was seen on 
the Mount, objectively before all nations, even 
as now subjectively by His spirit He reigns in 
the hearts of His people. Prophecy, as it be- 
comes fulfilled and passes into history, reveals 
this supernatural person, Christ. The New 
Testament supplements and completes the Old. 
The four Gospels that are a record of the life 
of Christ are a bright fulfillment of what Moses 
and the prophets saw, while the Acts of the 
Apostles and their Epistles, "Tell the old, old 
story, of Jesus and His glory ; of Jesus and 
His love." 

" All the light of sacred story 
Gathers round His head sublime." 

And in this light even secular history becomes 
in its prominent features a commentary on the 
Bible. For while the main purpose of Scrip- 
ture reveals the history of the Church on its 
way to the triumphant glory of the Messianic 
Kingdom, yet, incidentally, there is seen in 
outline the kingdoms of this world. Their 
rise, progress, and final destruction, is observa- 



78 JECCE REGNUM. 



ble in Daniel, while there is much in detail as 
respects some of them in the other books. 

Well, then, does the Apostle Peter, recog- 
nizing the supernatural element in prophecy, 
and how it has its fulfillment in actual events, 
call it the sure word and a shining light, more 
sure even in its testimony to the Kingdom 
than the Transfiguration, for while there were 
but three witnesses to the majesty on the 
Mount, all the world can read history, and if, 
as a whole, it cannot testify experimentally to 
its power and glory, not having the spiritual 
discernment, yet there is an innumerable host 
that can, even the whole company of believers, 
those whose minds have been illuminated by 
the Holy Spirit. 

Oh ! what a cloud of witnesses rise up to 
testify to the supernatural glory of Christ and 
His Kingdom. If we take into account all who 
have died believing, and all that are living 
now of like precious faith, how great the num- 
ber. "The Holy Church throughout all the 
world cry, Thou art the King of Glory, O 



THE LIGHT OF EXPERIENCE. 



79 



Christ ; Thou art the Everlasting Son of the 
Father." 

All hail the power of Jesus name, 

Let angels prostrate fall, 
Bring forth the royal diadem. 

And crown Him Lord of all. 



THE LIGHT OF EXPERIENCE. 

The Church cries because of its experience. 

There is an experimental insight that con- 
vinces the believer as no other evidence can. 
We may know a thing by picking it to pieces 
and examining its parts ; so we may know bread 
for instance, but such a knowledge does not 
satisfy our hunger, or so much convince us of 
the use of bread as the eating of it. It must go 
into us, and become a part of us, before it 
nourishes or does us any practical good. So of 
God and spiritual truth ; we must taste and 
see, must experiment with or experience the 
truth as it is in Jesus, in order to know its ex- 
cellence. So scientists experiment with nature, 
and obtain a knowledge of it. They get at the 



80 ECCE REGNUM. 



facts by experience and so construct their 
science. In their sphere they may be learned 
and great without religious knowledge, but in 
the realm of the supernatural, children, who 
know Jesus, practically, as a divine Saviour, are 
wiser. 

There is an experimental knowledge of the 
supernatural as well as of the natural, and if 
we accept the testimony of scientists as regards 
physical facts, why not, on the same princi- 
ple, receive the testimony of Christians as to the 
things of God's kingdom ? 

Believers do have a consciousness of these 
things in a sense that so convinces them, that 
they cannot be reasoned out of them. It is the 
consciousness of faitli which will become sight 
when that which is perfect is come ; that which 
rests upon the word of God, and in lively ex- 
ercise can say it knows, because God says so. 

The testimony of such faith is not to be despis- 
ed. It is as good as that which is born of scientific 
investigation, good to a demonstration, though 
it has reference to things hoped for and unseen. 
These things are something or nothing. If they 



THE LIGHT OF EXPERIENCE. 83 



all with, open face beholding as in a glass the 
glory of the Lord are changed into the same 
image from glory to glory as by the Spirit of 
God." Faith that is inwrought fastens upon a 
person, and not simply upon an abstract doc- 
trine, precept, law or principle. 

Through the Spirit there is a manifestation 
of Christ Himself to the soul, as He is seen not 
only to be a Priest and a Prophet, but a King — 
the King in His beauty. He is seen as trans- 
figured, and everything spiritual related to 
Him ; as angels, saints, heaven doctrines, pre- 
cepts, laws and principles are glorified, and 
holy in Him. Know Jesus to be the Son of 
God by the power of the Holy Ghost ; and 
then, from. His height of supernatural prospect, 
judge of the doctrines of the Incarnation, 
Atonement, Eesurrection, also of the law of 
God. His word and His work, the principles 
of His government and the objective manifesta- 
tion of them in the Messianic Kingdom. How 
they shine when they are connected with the 
supernatural Christ ! Seen to emanate from 
Him and center in Him, they are as a blaze of 



T 



82 ECCJE> REGNUM. 



God with Christ, and the glory that is to come 
thereof, which already casts a halo about the 
saints, they have not perceived. 

They do not study the word so as to en- 
ter into its depths. The scales of ignorance 
have often holden the eyes of the saints, 
and it is well when the Holy Spirit opens our 
understandings to receive the Scriptures and 
enables us to see Jesus Christ as He truly is in 
the field of the word of God like a treasure hid- 
den therein. So it is while all real believers 
have an experience of the truth as it is in Jesus, 
some have it in a higher degree than others, 
yet the different degrees are all of the same 
kind. They all belong like the glory of the 
Transfiguration and the light of prophecy and 
history, to the supernatural. They are not of 
nature, for spiritual things are spiritually dis- 
cerned, that is supernaturally by the Holy 
Ghost. The natural man discerneth not the 
things of the Spirit. The Father, through the 
Holy Spirit, reveals them. The soul illuminat- 
ed from on high sees Christ, and is transform- 
ed into His likeness. As says the Apostle, " we 



THE LIGHT OF EXPERIENCE. 83 

all with open face beholding as in a glass the 
glory of the Lord are changed into the same 
image from glory to glory as by the Spirit of 
God." Faith that is inwrought fastens upon a 
person, and not simply upon an abstract doc- 
trine, precept, law or principle. 

Through the Spirit there is a manifestation 
of Christ Himself to the soul, as He is seen not 
only to be a Priest and a Prophet, but a King — 
the King in His beauty. He is seen as trans- 
figured, and everything spiritual related to 
Him ; as angels, saints, heaven doctrines, pre- 
cepts, laws and principles are glorified, and 
holy in Him. Know Jesus to be the Son of 
God by the power of the Holy Ghost ; and 
then, from His height of supernatural prospect, 
judge of the doctrines of the Incarnation, 
Atonement, Resurrection, also of the law of 
God> His word and His work, the principles 
of His government and the objective manifesta- 
tion of them in the Messianic Kingdom. How 
they shine when they are connected with the 
supernatural Christ ! Seen to emanate from 
Him and center in Him, they are as a blaze of 



82 ECCE> REGNUM. 



God with Christ, and the glory that is to come 
thereof, which already casts a halo about the 
saints, they have not perceived. 

They do not study the word so as to en- 
ter into its depths. The scales of ignorance 
have often holden the eyes of the saints, 
and it is well when the Holy Spirit opens our 
understandings to receive the Scriptures and 
enables us to see Jesus Christ as He truly is in 
the field of the word of God like a treasure hid- 
den therein. So it is while all real believers 
have an exp jrience of the truth as it is in Jesus, 
some have it in a higher degree than others, 
yet the different degrees are all of the same 
kind. They all belong like the glory of the 
Transfiguration and the light of prophecy and 
history, to the supernatural. They are not of 
nature, for spiritual things are spiritually dis- 
cerned, that is supernaturally by the Holy 
Ghost. The natural man discerneth not the 
things of the Spirit. The Father, through the 
Holy Spirit, reveals them. The soul illuminat- 
ed from on high sees Christ, and is transform- 
ed into His likeness. .As says the Apostle, " we 



WISDOM. 



87 



the heavens above, the earth beneath, and the 
waters under the earth. Comprehensively, all 
things are for the glory of God, through the re- 
demption there is in Jesus Christ. 

In Him Creation is seen in a new light, so 
that it reflects the supernatural brightness of 
the Transfiguration. In Him the invisible per- 
fections of God are clearly seen by the things 
He has*ma1le. ' ' The heavens declare His glory, 
the firmament showeth His handiwork ; day 
unto day utters speech ; and night unto night 
showeth knowledge of Him." In Him the nat- 
uralist is wise and devout ; while he studies 
Creation and beholds in it the glory of God, he 
sings, "Let mountains and all hills, fruitful 
trees and all cedars, beasts and all cattle, 
creeping things and flying fowl, kings of the 
earth and all people, princes and all judges of 
the earth. Both young men and maidens, old 
men and children, let them praise the name of 
the Lord ; for His name alone is excellent ; His 
glory is above the earth and the heaven." He 
sings of a glory above nature ; yet all nature, 
as a mirror, reveals it in Christ the Lord. 



ECCE REGNUM. 



pression the seal. All that is true in Christ for 
the believer is made over to him. Christ cru- 
cified, risen, ascended, and coming again in 
glory for him, is all real in Him ; so that it is 
not so much the believer that lives, as the 
Christ who liveth in him. It is to Christ he 
looks ; it is from Him he draws his strength ; 
it is for Him he lives. 

But, in particular, we observe that the be- 
liever in Christ finds 

WISDOM. 

Christ being the Eternal Word, the fountain 
of all wisdom, gives it liberally to all of His 
members. The written Word that is but a re- 
flection of Himself, opens for them the mys- 
tery of life, giving the origin, use, and end of 
all things in Him; for, as it is written, "of 
Him, and through Him, and to Him are all 
things," all things created and uncreated, ma- 
terial and immaterial, all beings, forces, prin- 
ciples, laws, movements ; all science, art, his- 
tory, philosophy, institutions, every thing in 



WISDOM. 



87 



the heavens above, the earth beneath, and the 
waters under the earth. Comprehensively, all 
things are for the glory of God, through the re- 
demption there is in Jesus Christ. 

In Him Creation is seen in a new light, so 
that it reflects the supernatural brightness of 
the Transfiguration. In Him the invisible per- 
fections of God are clearly seen by the things 
He has made. ' - The heavens declare His glory, 
the firmament showeth His handiwork ; day 
unto day utters speech ; and night unto night 
showeth knowledge of Him. 55 In Him the nat- 
uralist is wise and devout ; while he studies 
Creation and beholds in it the glory of God, he 
sings, "Let mountains and all hills, fruitful 
trees and all cedars, beasts and all cattle, 
creeping things and flying fowl, kings of the 
earth and all people, princes and all judges of 
the earth. Both young jn en and maidens, old 
men and children, let them praise the name of 
the Lord ; for His name alone is excellent ; His 
glory is above the earth and the heaven. 55 He 
sings of a glory above nature ; yet all nature, 
as a mirror, reveals it in Christ the Lord. 



ECCE REGNUM. 



pression the seal. All that is true in Christ for 
the believer is made over to him. Christ cru- 
cified, risen, ascended, and coming again in 
glory for him, is all real in Him ; so that it is 
not so much the believer that lives, as the 
Christ who liveth in him. It is to Christ he 
looks ; it is from Him he draws his strength ; 
it is for Him he lives. 

But, in particular, we observe that the be- 
liever in Christ finds 

WISDOM. 

Christ being the Eternal Word, the fountain 
of all wisdom, gives it liberally to all of His 
members. The written Word that is but a re- 
flection of Himself, opens for them the mys- 
tery of life, giving the origin, use, and end of 
all things in Him ; for, as it is written, ' ' of 
Him, and through Him, and to Him are all 
things," all things created and uncreated, ma- 
terial and immaterial, all beings, forces, prin- 
ciples, laws, movements ; all science, art, his- 
tory, philosophy, institutions, every thing in 



RIGHTEOUSNESS. 91 

to others that we are righteous. It is life, it is 
spirit, it is power, which reproduced in the vis- • 
ible conduct of the believer, manifests that he 
not only appears to be a Christian, but that he 
Is one in truth. Without it, we can get, at 
most, a dry formal righteousness ; a mere imi- 
tation of Christ, that is in or out of conformity 
to the original, according to the media through 
which it is perceived ; as through Judaism, 
Romanism, or the different varieties of Prot- 
estantism. 

There are many observers, and they copy ac- 
cording to their impressions ; and to the in- 
quirer for truth, it is, lo ! here, lo ! there. 
Christ asks, ' ' Whom do men say that I, the 
Son of man, am V and the Jew says, Jeremiah, 
or one of the Prophets ; while to others He is 
the Pope, Paul, Calvin, Luther, Wesley, 
Roger Williams, Channing, Parker, Renan, or 
according to Strauss, a myth ; to others He is 
Christ. So His robe of righteousness, instead 
of retaining its seamless unity, is rent and 
parted, soiled and trampled upon. To the 
multitude He is anything or nothing, as they 



90 ECCE REGNUM. 



believer, by virtue of his union to his Lord, 
enters into His work of suffering and obedi- 
ence, and becomes a partaker of it. The sin 
and death inherited, by virtue of the union 
with the first Adam, passes over to Christ the 
second, while His righteousness and life is 
transferred to the believer. 

Says Luther, writing to his friend, Sponlain : 
"Art thou weary of thine own righteousness? 
I>ost thou rejoice in and trust thyself to 
the righteousness of Christ ? Learn, my dear 
brother, to know Christ and Him crucified. 
Learn to despair of thyself, and sing to the 
Lord this song : Lord Jesus Thou art my 
righteousness, but I am Thy sin ; Thou hast 
taken what was mine, Thou hast given me 
what was Thine own ; Thou hast become what 
Thou wast not that I might become what I 
was not." 

So we see that the righteousness that justi- 
fies before God is not simply a formal act, but 
a living principle derived from Christ. 

Within it is the source of all outward con- 
formity to the law of God, by which we show 



RIGHTEOUSNESS. 91 

to others that we are righteous. It is life, it is 
spirit, it is power, which reproduced in the vis- fei 
ible conduct of the believer, manifests that he 
not only appears to be a Christian, but that he 
is one in truth. Without it, we can get, at 
most, a dry formal righteousness ; a mere imi- 
tation of Christ, that is in or out of conformity 
to the original, according to the media through 
which it is perceived ; as through Judaism, 
Romanism, or the different varieties of Prot- 
estantism. 

There are many observers, and they copy ac- 
cording to their impressions ; and to the in- 
quirer for truth, it is, lo ! here, lo ! there. 
Christ asks, " Whom do men say that I, the 
Son of man, am ?" and the Jew says, Jeremiah, 
or one of the Prophets ; while to others He is 
the Pope, Paul, Calvin, Luther, Wesley, 
Roger Williams, Channing, Parker, Renan, or 
according to Strauss, a myth ; to others He is 
Christ. So His robe of righteousness, instead 
of retaining its seamless unity, is rent and 
parted, soiled and trampled upon. To the 
multitude He is anything or nothing, as they 



90 ECCE REGNUM. 



believer, by virtue of his union to his Lord, 
enters into His work of suffering and obedi- 
ence, and becomes a partaker of it. The sin 
and death inherited, by virtue of the union 
with the first Adam, passes over to Christ the 
second, while His righteousness and life is 
transferred to the believer. 

Says Luther, writing to his friend, Sponlain : 
"Art thou weary of thine own righteousness? 
Dost thou rejoice in and trust thyself to 
the righteousness of Christ ? Learn, my dear 
brother, to know Christ and Him crucified. 
Learn to despair of thyself, and sing to the 
Lord this song: Lord Jesus Thou art my 
righteousness, but I am Thy *sin ; Thou hast 
taken what was mine, Thou hast given me 
what was Thine own ; Thou'hast become what 
Thou wast not that I might become what I 
was not." 

So we see that the righteousness that justi- 
fies before God is not simply a formal act, but 
a living principle derived from Christ. 

Within it is the source of all outward con- 
formity to the law of God, by which we show 



RIGHTEOUSNESS. 95 



tertained, thus making the human reason the 
judge in the place of God. 

If it is true, says the objecter, then all of the 
good works that a man does, so far as his sal- 
vation is concerned, amounts to nothing. He is 
entirely unworthy and has no ability to save 
himself ; he is entirely dependent upon the 
sovereign mercy of God, hence, election, re- 
generation, decrees, and so on in a chain, one 
link leading to another, until there is a com- 
plete system that is like a yoke to which in all 
humility and meekness, the free will and proud 
reason of the natural man finds it difficult to 
bow, and therefore tries to break. But it is 
Christ's yoke, and needs only to be submitted 
to heartily, that it may be found easy and 
light. 

Sometimes it is received and rest is found to 
the soul, but often Jesus, only seen in connec- 
tion with other truth involved, becomes a stone 
of stumbling and a rock of offence. Some hit 
upon one point of doctrine, others upon other 
points. And it is not only singly and alone 
that persons become lame, but there are schools 



94 ECCE REGNUM. 



our sins. It is perfect in itself and does its work 
completely, therefore there is no occasion to 
try to improve it by some device of our own, 
or to look further for something else. "He 
that believeth does not make haste." He stays 
where he is, satisfied with the old Gospel as it 
is in Jesus, and has no itching ear like the 
Athenians of old, or many of the present day 
for something new. Having the heavenly bread 
that is sweeter than honey to his taste, he 
eschews that which is merely ritualistic, politi- 
cal and formal, as he would eject a husk or 
stone, that is, it is not in any sense to him 
spiritual food, but simply useful for a tempor- 
ary purpose, practically all moonshine to be 
used in the night and in the wilderness, until 
the day dawns and the Day Star appears. The 
motto of the satisfied soul is Jesus only. 
And why not ? Is He not sufficient ? Can we 
add lustre to the sun, or by any art whiten 
that which is whiter than snow ? But the doc- 
trine that salvation comes only through Jesus, 
ray some upon examination, involves so much 
that seems unreasonable that it cannot be en- 



RIGHTEOUSNESS. 95 



tertained, thus making the human reason the 
judge in the place of God. 

If it is true, says the objecter, then all of the 
good works that a man does, so far as his sal- 
vation is concerned, amounts to nothing. He is 
entirely unworthy and has no ability to save 
himself ; he is entirely dependent upon the 
sovereign mercy of God, hence, election, re- 
generation, decrees, and so on in a chain, one 
link leading to another, until there is a com- 
plete system that is like a yoke to which in all 
humility and meekness, the free will and proud 
reason of the natural man finds it difficult to 
bow, and therefore tries to break. But it is 
Christ's yoke, and, needs only to be submitted 
to heartily, that it may be found easy and 
light. 

Sometimes it is received and rest is found to 
the soul, but often Jesus, only seen in connec- 
tion with other truth involved, becomes a stone 
of stumbling and a rock of offence. Some hit 
upon one point of doctrine, others upon other 
points. And it is not only singly and alone 
that persons become lame, but there are schools 



94 ECCE REGNUM. 



4 



our sins. It is perfect in itself and does its work 
completely, therefore there is no occasion to 
try to improve it by some device of our own, 
or to look further for something else. "He 
that believeth does not make haste." He stays 
where he is, satisfied with the old Gospel as it 
is in Jesus, and has no itching ear like the 
Athenians of old, or many of the present day 
for something new. Having the heavenly bread 
that is sweeter than honey to his taste, he 
eschews that which is merely ritualistic, politi- 
cal and formal, as he would eject a husk or 
stone, that is, it is not in any sense to him 
spiritual food, but simply useful for a tempor- 
ary purpose, practically all moonshine to be 
used in the night and in the wilderness, until 
the day dawns and the Day Star appears. The 
motto of the satisfied soul is Jesus only. 
And why not ? Is He not sufficient ? Can we 
add lustre to the sun, or by any art whiten 
that which is whiter than snow ? But the doc- 
trine that salvation comes only through Jesus, 
ray some upon examination, involves so much 
that seems unreasonable that it cannot be en- 



SANCTIFICATION. 



and as the beams of doctrine go out from 
Him, so they find their unity in Him. They 
lead us to Him, and reveal Him to us as the 
source of all light and life and power. By 
them the Father draws us, as by a golden 
chain, to the foot of the Mount, and manifests 
Himself in the divine person of His Son. 

And this is His name, The Lord our Right- 
eousness. 

" Jesus, lover of my soul, 

Let rue to Thy bosom fly. 

****** 

Thou, O Christ, art all I want ; 
More than all in Thee I find." 



SANCTIFICATION. 

In Christ the believer is righteous. In like 
manner, also, he is holy, that is, in God's sight 
he is so. He is so because he is God's work- 
manship, created in "true holiness," as well 
as in righteousness. By righteousness he 
stands, by holiness he is pure. In the garment 
of salvation they both belong to the super- 



ECCE REGNUM. 



natural Christ, so when we say a believer is 
holy we do not mean that it is so much the be- 
liever as the Christ who dwelleth in him. In 
himself, that is in his flesh, dwelleth no good 
thing, but in Christ, being a partaker of a true 
holiness that is divine, he is holy. He is a 
saint. He is so because by a divine anointing 
he is set apart as a vessel of honor to show 
forth the praises of God He is " created unto 
good works." A principle of holiness is with- 
in as a seed, and ' ' he cannot sin because this 
seed remaineth in him.' ' It is out of this seed — 
Christ within — that all that is pure and lovely 
as respects the conduct of the believer in God' s 
sight proceeds. It is the pure heart which sees 
God, and upon which God looks in His judg- 
ment of character. "Man looketh upon the 
outward appearance ; God looketh upon the 
heart." 

It is the inward man that is renewed day by 
day. It is the spirit within that fills the soul 
with holy thoughts, desires, emotions, pur- 
poses. It is the white snow of the new nature 
separate from the old man of sin who was 



SANCTIFICATION. 99 

crucified on the cross, but still clings to the 
soul like the ghost of a dead body to torment 
it with its temptations and darts. It is 
the Jacob within that God loves as opposed to 
the Esau He hates. Let the two natures that 
dwell within the believer, like two persons, ex- 
plain and it is clear. Keep them distinct, and 
do not fuse them, and we hold on our way be- 
tween the Scylla of sinless perfection on the 
one side and the Charybdis of imperfect holi- 
ness on the other. We avoid the folly of try- 
ing to improve sin or whiten divine holiness. 
We make no attempt at the leopard's spots or 
the Ethiopian's skin, neither do we try to 
burnish the sun. We make a distinction be- 
tween God' s work and our own, and are satis- 
fied if we can do our own well without under- 
taking to do His. Yea, guided by this prin- 
ciple and passing the strait as ships enter the 
Mediterranean, so we find ourselves upon the 
open sea of thought, where the shores recede 
and the expanse is boundless. Holding on to 
it we make discoveries. Holiness and sin, we 
find, dwell not only in the secret chambers of 



100 ECCE REGNUM. 



the soul, but all around on the continents of 
the globe we see them embodied in the institu- 
tions of men and forming their character. 
They both have a history, and can be seen as 
they manifest themselves. Out in the desert 
of Paganism sin appears black and hairy, with 
hardly a covering. On the plains of Judaism 
and upon the highlands of nominal Christianity 
she arrays herself in a variety of artificial 
robes, but everywhere, back of all whitewash 
and paint, she is seen to be the same dark ob- 
ject, full of the vital force of a nature set on 
fire of Hell, destined to no improvement, but to 
go on from bad to worse unto destruction, and 
this because she has no ability in herself to 
change her character. That which is born of 
the flesh is flesh, and always remains so. It 
remains so in the regenerate as well as the un- 
regenerate, only in the regenerate its power is 
resisted by an antagonist that conquers. Con- 
quers not by improving, but by destroying it. 
" Thanks be to God who giveth us the victory 
through our Lord Jesus Christ." 

From sin we turn to holiness, and in all his- 






SAXCTIFICATION. 101 

tory and among all nations ; when she appears 
as she truly is, she is a pilgrim and a stranger. 
In the World but not of it, nsing it, as not 
abusing it, passing through as on a^ journey, 
serving God and doing good, "the law of God, 
the rule, the love of God the principle, and the 
glory of God the end of all of her activity." 
Look at Christ ; it is said of Him that ' ' He was 
holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from 
sinners," and He is the Head and pattern of all 
of the Saints. They are holy in Him, by re- 
ceiving Him into themselves, and thus partak- 
ing of His holy nature ; but this nature is not 
always manifest to believers themselves, or to 
others. It is only as they abide in Him, which 
it is their privilege and duty to do, that they 
are sensible of the life of holiness that is with- 
in them, and bear fruit ; then they rise in the 
divine life, not by any mechanical arrange- 
ment, but by the force of the life itself some- 
times to rapture ; and in some measure at 
least, comprehend with all Saints, heights and 
depths of love that gives them assurance, and 
make them not ashamed. So filled may they 



102 ECCE REGNUM. 



be with the Spirit, that they can enter into such 
experiences as are recorded of some distin- 
guished saints. It is possible for the Christian 
to constantly attain to a higher knowledge of 
holiness, while he sojourns as a pilgrim here ; 
but that this principle can be completely appre- 
hended and perfectly manifested in the mortal 
body, is as wrong to suppose, as it is to say 
that, as to its nature, it can be improved. It is 
not in this progressive sanctification, that is, 
the apprehension and manifestation of holiness, 
that the believer' s perfection lies, but rather in 
the purpose of God, that from all eternity, has 
separated him from the world in Christ Jesus, 
through the blood of the sacrifice and the gift 
of the Holy Ghost; as it is written, "Them 
that are sanctified by God the Father." 
" Wherefore, Jesus also, that He might sanc- 
tify the people with his own blood suffered 
without the gate." " Elect, according to the 
foreknowledge of God the Father, through 
sanctification of the Spirit." As one has said, 
"The Father from all eternity set apart His 
Son for His own sake, believers are in Christ, 



SANCTIFICATION. 



103 



and, therefore, are sanctified for Christ's 
sake," — sanctified by the blood. God sees the 
blood sprinkled upon their hearts, and He passes 
them by. Christ is their passover, He is their 
sanctiftcation. He is so, by the indwelling of 
the Holy Spirit who, as to essence, is one with 
Him, and by whom He performs a practical 
work of sanctification in the heart ; working in 
it to will and to do. It is here in Christ, that 
the believer' s perfection lies. 

In Christ he is perfect ; otherwise the pur- 
pose of God — the work of the atonement and 
the gift of the Holy Ghost — are a failure. It is 
in the apprehension and manifestation of that 
holiness, that has its source in the person of 
Christ, that we find imperfection. In this is 
progression, a constant walk ; one step leading 
to another, until this mortal puts on immor- 
tality. So, while in one sense the believer is 
perfect, in another he is not ; and is therefore 
exhorted to grow in grace and knowledge. 

If he lives in the Spirit, he is to walk in the 
Spirit. If God works in him to will and to do, 
he is to work out what God works in. If he 



m ECCE REGNUM. 



has a religions experience, or a life hid with 
Christ in God, it is to appear in all of the 
frnits of the Spirit ; " as love, joy, peace, long- 
suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meek- 
ness, temperance." If he has light, he is to let 
it shine. If he is perfect, he is to go on to per- 
fection ; "be perfect, even as his Father in 
heaven is perfect." 

A high standard of excellence and purity is 
before him, and in apprehending it in Christ, 
as He works by the Spirit within, and in 
making it manifest, lies his responsibility. 
Like the wind, the Spirit breathes within him, 
and he knows Him by his effects. 

It is in this perfection of experience and 
walk, that Christians are ever to make progress, 
glorify God and be happy. In this way the 
living principle of holiness or the life of Christ 
is made manifest, and while in itself it is per- 
fect and cannot bo improved, yet as developed 
in the lives of Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles, 
and holy persons of like precious faith as the 
entire Church on earth, it appears as imper- 
fect. 



SANCTIFICA TION. 



105 



Perfect and imperfect at the same time is 
written of Christians and the Church. 

" The riddle has two feet and were but one 
Cut off, truth falling to the ground were gone." 

Or as the same poet quaintly says. 

' ' I'm sinful, yet I have no sin — 
All spotted o'er, yet wholly clean, 
Blackness and beauty both I share, 
A hellish black, a heavenly fair." 

The Apostle Paul makes a clear distinction 
when he says to the Phillippians, ' ' not as though 
I had already attained either were already per- 
fect, but I follow after, if that I may apprehend 
that for which also I am apprehended of Christ 
Jesus. Brethren I count not myself to have 
apprehended, but this one thing I do, forgetting 
those things which are behind, and reaching 
forth unto those things which are before, I press 
toward the mark for the prize of the high calling 
of God in Christ Jesus. Let us, therefore, as 
many as be perfect be thus minded." All the 
Church is perfect. Spiritually, as the mystical 
body of Christ,* perfect. Formally; as split 

* Phil, iii, 12-13. 



106 ECCE REGNUM. 



into sects and modified by naturalism, imper- 
fect. Perfect in Christ,, imperfect in forms of 
worship, in administration of government, in 
mechanical arrangments, in all that pertains to 
theflesli. The perfection we get is one of nature 
or principle, this is uniform, constant and abid- 
ing, while forms are as clothing put on for a 
temporary purpose. The dress changes as the 
man grows. " When I was a child I spake as 
a child, I understood as a child, I thought as 
a child, but when I became a man I put away 
childish things. For now we see through a 
glass darkly, but then face to face ; now I know 
in part, but then I shall know even as also I 
am known." Face to face, knowledge to know- 
ledge, mortality swallowed up of life. " Cloth- 
ed upon from heaven." What is this but a re- 
velation of Christ himself as the believers sanc- 
tification \ What is it but transfigured purity 
as seen in the Kingdom on the Mount ? In this 
view, how completely is that which seems con- 
tradictory, blended in unity. We are now 
really perfect, yet by reason of imperfection it 
doth not yet appear that we are so. On the 



SANCTIFICATION. 



107 



Mount, in the kingdom, in glory with the king, 
it does — it will appear, for we shall be like 
Him. 

" Behold, where in a mortal form 
Appears each grace divine ; 
The virtues, all in Jesus melt, 
With mildest radiance shine. 

Be Christ our pattern and our guide ; 

His image may we bear : 
Oh, may we tread his holy steps, 

His joy and glory share ! " 



REDEMPTION. 

Again, Christian experience is of redemption. 
In Christ the believer not only sees, stands, and 
is pure, but Tie shines. 

In Christ, as God's workmanship, he has 
brightness. He is glorified soul and body. 
Christ is the redemption of the believer in every 
sense, as He is Redeemer, and the price of re- 
demption; but here we refer to the last finishing 
touch that which is the completion of the whole 
of His work, to wit: "the redemption of the 
body" "the manifestation of the sons of God 



108 ECCE REGNUM. 



in glory. ' ' Glory means brightness, and it is ob- 
jective, as on the Mount. Moses, Elijah, and 
Christ, appeared in glory there. Moses had 
been buried, but there he is in the body. Elijah 
had been translated, and there he is changed 
entirely into the glorious image of his Lord. 
Real persons are these, not ghostly phantoms ; 
solid substance, not thin air — soul and body 
united in glory we see, giving us the identical 
Moses who led the children of Israel out of 
Egypt, the same Elijah that discomfited the 
Prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel. There they 
are with Jesus talking with Him ; the same 
Jesus who was born of the Virgin Mary, who 
suffered under Pontius Pilate, was cruci- 
fied, dead, and buried. The same who has 
risen from the grave and ascended to heaven, 
from whence we are told He is to come, "and 
change the vile bodies of the saints and fashion 
them like unto His glorious body," and so 
bring them all into the same state of transfigu- 
ration. Now, what more do we need to assure 
us of the reality of the future state, and of the 
redemption of the body, than what is given 



REDEMPTION. 



109 



here so clearly in GocT s word ? Questions 
arise, and men imagine, speculate, or guess, 
and give us dreams ; but here are facts of 
the nature of historical events. Supernatural 
to be sure, but no less real — facts which 
believing, establish us, as on the everlasting 
rock, where unmoved by the winds of various 
[ doctrine, all of our steps are ordered aright. 

Is it the old question, as to " how are the dead 
raised up and with what body do they come ? " 

What better answer can we find than Paul's 
to the Corinthians, as we read by the light of 
the transfiguration. " Thou fool," says the 
Apostle, "that which thou so west is not quick- 
ened, except it die ; and that which thou 
sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall 
be, but bare grain, it may chance of wheat, or 
of some other grain. But God giveth it a body 
as it hath pleased Him, and to every seed His 
own body"* The figure of the grain ex- 
plains it. There is a principle in the seed 
which connects the old, which passes away 
with the new that appears, the new springs out 

* 1 Cor. xv. 36-38. 



110 ECCE REGNUM. 



of the old, the new is the old, that is, it is 
wheat, that is, it has the form, the color, the 
taste of wheat and not of corn, or any other 
grain. Identity in this way- is preserved, so 
that place it where you will, in the ground, or 
in the ear, as we see it in harvest, and it is the 
same, it has its own body. So the mortal 
body of the saint ; it has within it an im- 
mortal principle, that longs for a new dress ; 
it is therefore " sown in corruption, it is raised 
in incorruption." The mortal dies or is put 
oil like an old garment, but the living princi- 
ple is reproduced in a new immortal body, God 
giveth it a body, yet it is its own body, and 
not the body of another ; identity is preserved — 
so is it — a man that is buried — it is a man and 
not a beast, or an angel that is raised. Is it 
Moses or Elijah ? Behold, in glory they appear 
in garments white and glistening, the same per- 
sons that walked the earth, with the same form, 
the same features, abating all that may have 
been defective ; new bodies they have, but they 
are their own, and by them they are known, 
by those who knew them here. 



4 



REDEMPTION. 



Ill 



Is not this enough, in answer to the ques- 
tion, How are the dead raised up, and with 
what body do they come? Raised as the 
wheat is raised, by the power of God ; clothed 
upon from Heaven, by the same power, with a 
body new and immortal. A body not an- 
other's, but their own. So we shall be our- 
selves in heaven, and there we shall meet with 
others who shall be themselves ; and here, we 
find another question that is often asked, an- 
swered ; Shall we recognise each other in 
Heaven ? If we know as much there, as we do 
here, we certainly shall know each other. 
But as to this, he who asks a question that 
implies a doubt, is certainly a fool. "Thou 
fool," says the Apostle. 

Ah, but some will say, it is mysterious. So 
it is, wonderfully so ; but it is true, gloriously 
true. All things run out into mystery ; the 
forces and processes in the vegetable world, 
the connection of the soul and body, all the 
powers of matter and spirit — life itself. To 
how great an extent are they hidden from us ? 
Mystery here, however, does not hinder us 



112 ECCE REGNUM. 



from accepting them as realities, and making 
them of service. We go on using our souls 
and our bodies, sowing seed and reaping har- 
vests ; handling steam, electricity, the light 
and the winds, if we do not understand every- 
thing about them. Wonderful progress has 
been made in this way, so that we boast, in this 
nineteenth century, of great civilization. Steam 
propels our carriages ; the lightning carries 
our thoughts, and various forces in a thou- 
sand forms of machinery in the factory, the 
shop and the field, yield us valuable service. 
Here, we are no fools, but practical men and 
women, bent on improvement, and striving for 
success. We do not stop the wheels, destroy 
business, and starve ourselves, that all mys- 
teries in nature may be solved at once , but we 
work with what is at hand, and make dis- 
coveries, or others do for us, as we advance. 
What we know not now, we expect to know 
hereafter. All along the route we shall pick 
up knowledge, and thus may be able to con- 
tribute more and more to a grander civilization 
than that which spreads and towers now. We 



REDEMPTION. 113 






are wise in tlie world for the world, in our gen- 
eration ; but forsooth, because there is mys- 
tery about Jesus and the redemption of the 
body, He is rejected, and His doctrine ac- 
counted foolishness. This spirit is to be con- 
demned ; it is as though a man who goes forth 
to sow, should refuse to take the seed that God 
has created, because there is mystery about it, 
and expect to reap a harvest with some imita- 
tion of his own device, made, perchance, of 
wood or stone, thereby showing a want of con- 
fidence in God's method, and a conceit for his 
own. It is a spirit that comes of unbelief and 
that pride of intellect which, boasting of itself, 
asks questions of God, for no other reason but 
' ' to catch something out of His mouth, whereby 
to accuse Him." It is the same that Jesus en- 
countered, among the Pharisees and Saddu- 
cees, the same that Paul found at Athens, in 
Stoic and Epicurean. The same that at pres- 
ent dissolves the supernatural into the natural, 
puts everything, matter and spirit, into the 
alembic of natural science, and will hold to 
nothing, but what it can see in some phase of 



1 14 ECCE REGNUM. 



naturalism. If Job was at all tinctured by 
this spirit, and thought himself something 
when he was nothing, how effectually was he 
cured, when Grod tried him with questions, 
out of the whirlwind. " Who is this that 
darkeneth counsel by words without know- 
ledge ? Gird up now thy loins like a man ; for 
I will demand of thee, and answer thou me." 
" Where wast thou, when I laid the founda- 
tions of the earth ? declare if thou hast under- 
standing." "Hast thou entered into the 
springs of the sea, or hast thou walked in the 
search of the depth?" "Have the gates of 
death been opened unto thee, or hast thou 
seen the doors of the shadow of death?" 
' ' Where is the way where light dwelleth, and 
as for darkness, where is the place thereof ?" 
"Hast thou entered into the treasures of the 
snow, or hast thou seen the treasures of the 
hail ?" " Hath the rain a father, or who hath 
begotten the drops of dew ?" " Canst thou bind 
the sweet influences of Pleiades, or loose the 
bands of Orion?" "Canst thou bring forth 



REDEMPTION. 



115 



Mazzaroth in his season, or canst thou guide 
Arcturus with his sons ? " * * * 

1 ' Moreover, the Lord answered Job and said : 
Shall he that contendeth with the Almighty, 
instruct Him ? He that reproveth God, let him 
answer it. Then Job answered the Lord and 
said : Behold, I am vile ; what shall I answer 
Thee ? I will lay mine hand upon my mouth. 
Once have I spoken, but I will not answer, yea 
twice, but I will proceed no further." And 
again, " I know that thou canst do everything, 
and that no thought can be holden from Thee. 
Who is he that hideth counsel without know- 
ledge ? therefore have I uttered that I under- 
stood not ; things too wonderful for me, which 
I knew not. Hear, I beseech Thee, and I will 
speak : I will demand of Thee, and declare 
Thou unto me. I have heard of Thee by the 
hearing of the ear ; but now mine eye seeth 
Thee. Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent 
in dust and ashes." 

The patriarch bowed in humility before the 
Great God. "Brought face to face with Him he 



* Job. xxxviii-xl. 



116 ECCE REGNUM. 



sees his ignorance and his vileness, and is 
dumb. He submits, and is thus prepared for 
the blessing which follows. " The Lord also 
accepted Job." "And the Lord turned the 
captivity of Job when he prayed for his 
friends, also, the Lord gave Job twice as much 
as he had before." He blessed him in his pos- 
sessions, in his children, and in a long life. 
" After this Job lived a hundred and forty 
years, and saw his sons, and his sons' sons, 
even four generations. So Job died being old 
and full of days." 

How different is this spirit of faith, humility 
arid submission from that other we have no- 
ticed of unbelief, pride and self- will. The one 
is practical, the other speculative. The former 
accepts God and His Word to start with, and 
goes forward to reap a spiritual harvest of 
knowledge and strength by the use of the 
means of grace as God has ordained ; the latter 
rejects the seed of the Word in which is life, 
and therefore mystery, and is ever learning, 
but never able to come to a knowledge of the 
truth. One feeds upon the living bread that 



REDEMPTION. 



117 






comes down from Heaven ; the other picks it 
to pieces. One hears the words of Jesus, and 
is like the wise man who built upon the rock 
and is secure ; while the other is foolish enough 
to take the shifting sand of human wisdom and 
work upon that. Finally, dowm comes his 
house, and u the greater the pile the more 
disastrous the ruin." Some things are first, 
and in the solution of mysteries and in striv- 
ing for truth and success, a divine order is to be 
observed. God before man ; the seed before the 
tree ; the foundation before the superstructure ; 
faith before reason ; the Kingdom of Heaven be- 
fore other things. " Before honor," says Solo- 
mon, "is humility," but u pride goeth before 
destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall. ' ' 
AVe believe that it was by observing the divine 
order that leads to success that Job was en- 
abled to endure with patience his trials, learn 
wisdom, hold fast his integrity and become 
prosperous. Because of his humility and faith 
that ever gave him an ear attentive to God's 
AVord, he knew something of the future state, 
and of the redemption of the body. With all 



118 ECCE REGNUM. 



our vaunted progress in science now, we can- 
not deny his words and be true ; true science 
agrees with them. Christ and His Apostles 
confirm them. According to his prayer they 
have been printed in a book, yes, The Book, 
" graven with an iron pen in the rock forever," 
and there they will remain to shed light upon 
the future and guide pilgrims to glory, while, 
one after another of the works of skeptics shall 
be read, and then forgotten. Man craves cer- 
tainty about the future, he does not like to be 
thrust out into dreamland ; therefore, he loves 
the inspired I know of the Patriarch. It meets 
his want. ' ' For I know, ' ' says Job, ' ' tliat my 
Redeemer liveth, and that He shall stand at the 
latter day upon the earth. And though after 
my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my 
flesh shall I see God / whom I shall see for my- 
self, and mine eyes shall behold, -and not 
another ; though my reins be consumed within 
me"* How could the doctrine of the redemp- 
tion of the body be stated in plainer terms. 
There is no attempt to solve the mystery, or 

* Job xix, 25 27. 



REDEMPTION. 119 



show how it can be redeemed, but simply a lit- 
eral statement of fact, that will stand as a stub- 
born thing forever, against every allegorical and 
mystical interpretation. 

Mark the words, and observe how they re- 
veal persons, time, and place, compare with 
other scripture, and see how the whole is ar- 
ranged in glory on the Mount, in the kingdom 
of God, there as revealed to Peter, James, and 
John. Behold, the Redeemer Christ, and the 
two, Elijah and Moses, representative of a 
greater company of the glorified saints. Let 
time go on until the " latter-day"* or to " the 
resurrection at the last day," or to the " resur- 
rection of the just," f or to the hour that Christ 
said was l ' coming, in the which all that are in 
the graves shall come forth, they that have done 
good unto the resurrection of life, and they 
that have done evil unto the resurrection of 
damnation."^: Then enlarge the scene, bring in 
all of the saints, the dead and the living, Job 
among them. Let them come back to this earth 
after they have been raised from their graves, 

* Luke, xlv, 14. t John, xl, 24. $ John v, 28-29. 



120 ECCE REGNUM, 



or caught up into the air as were Enoch and 
Elijah. Let them come with Christ the King, 
when he shall come in His kingdom, in the glory 
of the Father, and with all the holy angels ; let 
them stand upon this earth in their glorified 
bodies, the same that they had in the flesh, only 
changed, made immortal and spiritual, as Paul 
explains ; the same, only fashioned after Christ's 
own glorious body ; the same, that is their own 
and not another' s or somebody' s else. In a word, 
let the kingdom come and the will of the Lord be 
done in the earth, as it is in Heaven. Let this 
earth be made heavenly by that power with 
which Christ is able to subdue all things unto 
himself ; then shall it appear that Job was 
right, and that to him in person, is literally 
verified all that he has so positively expressed 
in his simple, but forcible statement, concern- 
ing the redemption of the body. Observe, again. 
In his flesh, he says, he shall see God — with 
his eyes behold Him. Yes, though the worms 
have destroyed that flesh and those eyes. In- 
credible says the skeptic, unscriptural says the 
speculative philosopher, for we read "that flesh 



REDEMPTION. 



121 



and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God." 
Is there a contradiction here, then ? JSTot ac- 
cording to the explanation of Paul, nor, as the 
truth is seen in Jesus, as He appeared on the 
Mount, or as He showed Himself by many in- 
fallible proofs to His disciples, after His resur- 
rection. 

There are different kinds of flesh. Does not 
the Apostle say so? As it is written: "All 
flesh is not the same flesh, but there is one kind 
of flesh of men, another flesh of beasts, another 
of fishes, another of birds. There are also 
celestial bodies, and bodies terrestial ; but the 
glory of the celestial is one, and the 6 glory of 
the terrestial is another."* So Job does not 
mean that it is in the flesh of birds, or fishes, 
or even in his mortal flesh that he shall see God, 
but rather in his own immortal flesh, or body, 
a body incorruptible and celestial, like the 
bright shining one of Christ's on the Mount. 
Mortal flesh cannot inherit the kingdom of God, 
only, as it is changed into the immortal, raised 
in celestial glory, and fashioned after Christ's 



*ICor. xv. 



122 ECCE REGNUM 



glorious body, then, it is not called flesh but 
spirit. Then it is not natural, but spiritual. 

' ' Howbeit, that was not first which is spiritual, 
but that which is natural, and afterward that 
which is spiritual." So it is in transfigured, in- 
corruptible flesh, that the Patriarch shall stand 
in the latter-day upon the earth. It is with 
eyes that can never feel pain or grow dim, that 
he shall look upon his Redeemer, and see God in 
Christ, his corruptible flesh puts on in corrupti- 
ble spirit, his mortal natural body is clothed upon 
from heaven with immortality, and then he ap- 
pears in the kingdom with Elijah and Moses ; 
he stands with them perchance upon a Mount, 
or he sits with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, 
upon thrones ; at all events, he appears in glory ; 
he has reached perfection and is at home. 

The home of the glorified, the home of the 
blest. 

' ' We speak of the realms of the blest, 
That country so bright and so fair, 
And oft are its glories confessed ; 
But what must it be to be there ! " 

From the foregoing we notice that Paul and 



REDEMPTION. 123 



Job are joined in one faith and in one testi- 
mony as to the redemption of the body. The 
reasoning of the former and the statement of 
the latter agree, and, as they do so, they throw 
the Gates Ajar, and reveal heavenly persons, 
places and things as realities. Their words 
do not quite give lis open vision or sight, but 
they beget within lis a f aith so strong, that it is 
well defined by the Apostle as "the substance 
of things hoped for and the evidence of things 
not seen" — a faith that will be sight by and 
by ; that which is equal to a demonstration 
now of that which shall actually appear here- 
after, when Christ himself shall come in His 
glory. It is in Him toe find the truth. Patri- 
arch and Apostle both point to Him, and 
their words are verified, not only in His teach- 
ings and by manifestation of His power, as at 
the grave of Lazarus, but He personally illus- 
trates the truth, not only in the Transfigura- 
tion, but in the resurrection of His own body, 
and in what He did in that body for forty 
days, even until the clouds of heaven receive 
Him out of sight. In that body restored from 



124 ECCE REGNUM. 



the grave he ate and drank, walked and 
talked. It was His own body ? and not an- 
other's. It was himself, His own flesh and 
bones, and not His ghost. The disciples 
thought it might be an apparition, but He put 
them at rest as He appeared to them, convin- 
cing even doubting Thomas, by showing the 
prints of the nails and of the spear. It was 
Jesus, their Lord and Saviour ; the same they 
had followed from place to place in His minis- 
try, the same that a little before had died for 
them on the Cross. He is alive forever more, 
and has the keys of death and of hell; and 
because He lives, they and all that are His 
shall live also. Faith leans upon & living and 
not a dead Christ. Jesus did literally rise 
from the dead, and, in the body that He ap- 
peared in, believers may see theirs, for they 
are to be like Him. This body was one adapt- 
ed to heaven as well as to the earth, and to 
the earth as well as to heaven. While, if its 
owner pleased, it could conform to earthly con- 
ditions and natural laws, yet it was above 
them and unrestrained by them. And is not 



REDEMPTION. 



125 



this a desirable power to have as connected 
with the body — to be above all terrestrial forces, 
yet able to use them at pleasure ? Out of 
danger by steam, lightning, wind or flood, 
heat or gravity ; while they, like good ser- 
vants, are obedient to control. To be able to 
walk the earth, dwell with men, and mingle in 
earthly scenes, and at the same time ascend 
the skies and live in glory with saints and an- 
gels. To have earth under our feet and heaven 
open day and night, and, with Christ, have 
power in both realms. What is this but lib- 
erty — the liberty of the sons of God ? Men cry 
liberty in the corruptible flesh, and fight for it, 
but they never get it ; not until this corrupti- 
ble puts on incorruption, and this mortal is 
clothed with immortality. While we cry and 
fight, our bodies are frozen by the cold, 
scorched by the heat, shattered by the light- 
ning, dissolved by disease, racked with pain, 
and turned to dust. But it is not so in the res- 
urrection ; then these forces that now master 
become subjects, and obey the free, untrammeled 
Spirit; so that we "run and are not weary, 



126 ECCE REGNUM. 



walk, and are not faint, yea, mount up as on 
eagle's wings." In tlie power of the redeemed 
body, what may we not accomplish. 

It is to be like Christ's glorious body, adap- 
ted both to earth and heaven — like His, it will 
eat bread and drink wine in the Kingdom ; 
like His, it may dispense with them altogether, 
or use some heavenly manna of another sort ; 
like His, it will walk and talk by the way, 
or upon the Mount with disciples, brethren 
and friends, and then, perchance, suddenly 
disappear; like His, buoyant with everlast- 
ing life, it will rise to meet the Lord in the 
air, and then descend in the clouds, with 
power and great glory ; dwell with men and 
reign on the earth ; and all this not as carnal, 
but as spiritual. We shall be like Him. TTe 
may then see as He sees, hear as He hears, feel 
as He feels, go where He goes, do as He does, 
know as He knows. All that is beautiful to 
His eye, harmonious to His ear, sensitive to 
His touch ; every path He travels, and all 
work or pleasure He pursues, and everything 
He knows, all, to some extent, at least, may be 



REDEMPTION. 



127 



ours, for toe shall be like Him. What possi- 
bilities of knowledge, happiness, and glory, 
are here involved. Knowledge like His ! even 
that which is ont of sight of all the facts or 
dreams of modern science, beyond the under- 
standing of the angels, into the profoundest 
mysteries of creation and redemption. Hap- 
piness like His ! even that which is deeper than 
the sea, and purer than snow drifted in sun- 
light. " The fulness of joy at His right hand, 
the pleasures that are forever more." 

Glory like His ! even that which is above the 
earth and the heavens, the light of the know- 
ledge of the glory of God as with the Lord and 
the saints it comes down to earth, and in 
another transfiguration reveals the Kingdom 
of God. A glory of which the saints have an 
experience here, some more, some less, some 
at conversion, some after ; some, perhaps, not 
until the hour of death. With one it has been 
a prospect from some Pisgah height, with 
another a foretaste as of grapes from Eschol, 
and still with another as a breath of purity and 



128 ECCE REGNUM. 

fragrance from the green fields beyond the 

swelling stream — 

" The men of grace have found 
Glory begun below," 

and this glory is not only future, but like all 
the parts of the great salvation under consider- 
ation, as wisdom, righteousness and sanctifica- 
tion, it is present. These "men of grace" see 
the redemption of their bodies now and here. 
And conceding a power of the Holy Ghost that 
operates npon the souls and bodies of men, is 
it not truly philosophical to believe that it be- 
gins in regeneration, and may be perceived 
then, or at some other stage of. the Christian 
experience ? for what is regeneration but re- 
demption in embryo, that is, an operation of 
the same nature produced by the same super- 
natural power. So if a man is regenerated he 
feels the resurrection. The point is this, that 
the redemption of the body begins at regenera- 
tion, whether there is a consciousness of it or 
not, e. g. : as the infant begins at conception, 
but does not appear until birth, so there is a 
principle implanted in regeneration that re- 



REDEMPTION. 129 



mains hidden, as the seed of the incorruptible 
body, until it appears in glory at the coming 
of the Lord. In this way the body is touched 
in regeneration, though it is through the soul, 
that is, through the intellectual and moral 
powers thereof, that the spiritual principle 
reaches it. We do not grasp the Spirit physi- 
cally, but receiving Him through faith in Jesus 
Christ He enters the body and makes it His 
temple. "Know ye not," says the Apostle, 
"that your bodies are the temple of the Holy 
Ghost." Even so we believe, and thence infer 
that away back in the ' ' sanctum sanctorum ' ' of 
our being, in the very heart of ourselves, God 
dwells, and at times floods us with His light as 
of old from the Holy of Holies within, out- 
ward through the tabernacle and over the camp 
it was spread u for a glory and a covering." 
Verily, is not this the philosophy of God % A 
process from within out, that is, a growth by 
whose power a heavenly temple is raised, into 
which all of the saints are incorporated as 
living stones. So certainly the Apostle inti- 
mates in his Epistle to the Ephesians, when he 



130 ECCE REGNUM. 



says of them — they having received the Spirit 
— that they "are no more strangers and for- 
eigners, bnt fellow-citizens with the saints, and 
of the household of God. And are built upon 
the foundation of the Apostles and prophets, 
Jesns Christ Himself being the chief corner- 
stone, in whom all the bnilding, fitly framed 
together, gkow t eth unto a holy temple in the 
Lord ; in whom ye also are builded together 
for an habitation of God through the Spirit."* 
They are built now — present tense — into the 
temple. 

The question has been asked, ' \ did any man 
ever become conscious of anything more, in 
passing from death to life, in his conversion, 
other than and beyond the consciousness of a 
change in character and love?" We reply, 
undoubtedly. Some have experienced the new 
body. They have beheld the glory thereof, 
and confessed to its power, and this not sim- 
ply through a process of reasoning, but through 
a revelation of Christ by the Spirit. They see 
the truth as it is in Jesus, the fact of redemp- 

* Eph. ii, 19-22. 



REDEMPTION. 131 



tion is clearly revealed in His glorified body, 
not abstractly as a doctrine, but practically 
and literally as a thing personal to themselves. 
By the Spirit they are built into Him as living- 
stones into a living temple, so that they be- 
come partakers of His glory as it fills the 
building. They are so engrafted into the body 
of Christ, that what belongs to Him belongs to 
them, bone of His bone they are, flesh of His 
flesh. But of Him are ye in Christ Jesus says 
the Apostle, of Him and in Him, as the branch 
is of the vine and in the vine. In Him, just as 
by natural birth they are in Adam. One with 
Christ as Moses and Elijah were one with Him 
on the mount, only just now it doth not ap- 
pear as it did in their bodies. It will, however, 
when He who is their life shall appear in glory, 
then shall they be like Him, because they are 
in Him by nature first. They are partakers of 
a nature as well as a character, they get a per- 
son as well as a principle. They hold the Head 
and with Him they get all other things spirit- 
ual, all doctrines, all character, all principles, 
all laws, all persons, that are truly spiritual 



132 ECCE REGNUM. 



and Christian, and tliey get them as they ought 
in a vital way, and thus grow out of them, 
and into them, and around them, and with 
all others are built up as the mystical 
body of Christ. One Church, clear in know- 
ledge, pure in character, sound in principle, 
righteous to law, in spiritual fellowship with 
all saints, and comprehending with them, the 
heights and depths of the love of God as mani- 
fested in Christ. To such persons, no doctrine 
is true that does not come from Christ, and 
draw Him personally near, no character 
lovely that does not manifest His holiness, no 
principle genuine, that does not bring forth 
fruit to His glory, and no person a Christian, 
who does not imbibe His Spirit. 

We believe now when any one says he gets 
only Christian love and character in conversion, 
he is mistaken. He does not apprehend all 
there is for him in Christ, for it is true, if he is 
converted, he has Christ Himself. He has 
found Him of whom Moses and the Prophets 
did write — the Messiah — the Son of God, the 
Son of man. The God-man bv the Incarna- 



REDEMPTION. 133 



tion ; to Him he is joined by a vital union, as 
the branch to the vine. So that what belongs 
to Christ belongs also to him. The glorified 
body is Christ's, therefore, it is his. Is he of 
Christ and in Him, and is He made unto him 
wisdom and righteousness and sanctification ? 
then He is his redemption also, and he may 
say without presumption, not that he shall rise 
at the last day in glory only, but that he is 
risen now: "quickened together with Christ" 
as Paul says to the Ephesians ; and if he is 
risen with Him, he sees the force of the exhor- 
tation to "set his affections on things above," 
and so, up goes his soul along the shining 
track to the heavenly places, into the Holy of 
Holies, into the very presence of his Lord, 
from whose glorified person he sees the gentle 
stream of his life of love, and all the powerful 
principles of his Christian character proceed- 
ing. No longer is it love and character sim- 
ply, but Christ. Christ crucified, Christ risen, 
Christ in heaven, Christ coming again in glory. 
His conversation or citizenship is in heaven, 
from whence he is looking for his Saviour to 



134 ECCE BEGNUM. 



come and change his vile body, and fashion it 
like unto His glorious body, and then shall he 
be forever with the Lord, in glory. His faith 
fastens upon a person and His religion is a life 
hid with Him in God. A supernatural blessed 
life. Aye, it is not so much he that lives, as 
the Christ who liveth in him. One with Him 
in the crucifixion, the resurrection, the aseen- 
sion, he shall be one with Him in the coming 
glory, one with Him in His Kingdom, even 
as Moses and Elijah were one with Him visi- 
bly on the Mount : partakers of His life, His 
nature, His body, His glory. 

Lord Jesus are we one with Thee ? 

O height, O depth of love ! 
With Thee we died upon the tree, 

In Thee we live above. 

Such was Thy grace that for our sake, 
Thou didst from heaven come down ; 

Our mortal flesh and blood partake ; 
In all our misery one. 

Our sins, our guilt, in love divine 

Were borne on earth by Thee : 
The gall, the curse, the wrath were Thine, 

To set Thv members free. 



REVIVAL. 135 

Ascended now in glory bright, 

Still one with us Thou art ; 
Nor life, nor death, nor depth, nor height, 

Thy saints and Thee can part. 

Soon, soon shall come that glorious day, 

Whjen seated on Thy throne, 
Thou shalt to wondering world's display, 

That Thou with us art one. 



REVIVAL. 

In the light that reveals redemption believers 
have experimentally an understanding of other 
spiritual phenomena, which it may be well at this 
point to notice. In view of the power of the 
Holy Ghost, that enters the body, touches it, 
and makes it its temple, the bodily translation 
of Enoch and Elijah, the manifestations on the 
day of Pentecost at Jerusalem, the third 
heaven rapture of the Apostle Paul, many of 
the ecstatic experiences of Christians as re- 
corded in the history of the Church, as well as 
some of the phenomena connected with revi- 
vals of religion, all seem credible and to fol- 



T 



136 ECCE REGNUM. 



low as naturally as zephyrs and hurricanes 
come of the wind. 

Jesus Himself compares the Spirit to this 
mighty force, and can it be supposed that He 
is any the less real or powerful % If the wind 
can seize Old Ocean and lift him aloft in mighty 
billows, cannot the Holy Spirit breathe upon 
the soul, and through it cause every nerve and 
fibre of the body to thrill with ecstacy, and 
send the whole man as in a chariot to Heaven \ 
Verily, there is no trouble in explaining 
spiritual phenomena if we believe in the Holy 
Ghost a revealed in the Word of God. 
Through faith in this supernatural agent they 
are made clear without the aid of the physi- 
cian or the skill of the chemist. Sometimes 
there has been much excitement attendant 
upon revivals of religion. Doubtless with the 
genuine there has, through human imperfec- 
tion, been an alloy of the spurious. Indeed, 
we may believe there is an excitement called 
spiritual that is all dross, without any mixture 
of the Holy Spirit ; an excitement that comes 
entirely of the old Adam, as it is controlled by 



REVIVAL. 137 



the Prince of the Power of the Air, the Spirit 
that worketh in the children of disobedience. 
Down through the ages we see it has come along 
parallel with the work of the Holy Spirit, 
an imitation of it, and in reality a counterfeit 
and a pretence. It moves in history, but does 
not come from the secret place of the Most 
High, but from the Prophets' " chamber of 
imagery,' ? * wrapped up in all the vain imagin- 
ations of the natural heart. Sentimental, ani- 
mal, intellectual, superstitious, infidel, idola- 
trous, it developes into every shape of evil. 
All false religions, all infidel forms spring from 
it. It is attended by a long procession of sor- 
cerers, magicians, and false prophets, all of 
the way from Jannes and Jambres, who with- 
stood Moses, up to our modern trance necro- 
mancers and soothsayers. Of course this 
Spirit is often rapturous and ecstatic. She has 
power enough for this, for she has the force of 
the human imagination and physical magnet- 
ism, to say nothing of the supernaturalism of 
Satan It is not strange that she performs 

Ezek. viii. 



138 ECCE REGNUM. 



wonders that look like miracles, and coming 
with them into the very midst of the assem- 
blies of the saints, should deceive many, turn 
them away from revivals and make them harsh 
critics thereof. But let there not be severe 
judgment because of the counterfeit, there is 
the genuine for all of that, and we need not 
be troubled because of the imperfection of the 
flesh. The truth, as it is in Jesus, and time 
will test any man' s experience and the work in 
all revivals as in a furnace, so that finally the 
dross will disappear, and the pure gold, if any, 
be revealed. We cannot get perfect revivals 
of religion any more than we can get perfect 
Christians, but revivals will come, they must 
come, they are a necessity in the Church, and 
are sent of God to accomplish His purposes of 
mercy in the world. "It is not by might nor 
by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord." 
We need not, then, cry out against religious 
excitement, and genuine rapturous feeling and 
enthusiasm in our meetings, because perchance 
it may be mixed with that which is false, any- 
more than against Christians, because they have 



REVIVAL 139 

faults. Perfection in revivalism we may not 
get, but it is our privilege to proceed according 
to decency and order, and rise higher and 
higher towards it, as we discover the spurious 
and reject it, and find the genuine and cherish 
it. Men often make bad work with their 
various mechanical arrangements. They pro- 
duce an excitement and call it religion ; but 
like the clatter of a mill, or the hum of a fac- 
tory, it is activity without life. We had relig- 
ion once, but we lost it, said a people of a cer- 
tain village, to a colporteure, as from house to 
house he talked with them about Christ. We 
are going to get it again when the revival sets 
in, though. It s coming again in two or three 
weeks. What did these people mean % Evid- 
ently that at home they had no religion, but in 
the meeting that would be full of excitement, 
there they would find it. And .how was this 
excitement to be produced % As the colporteure 
learned afterwards, by noise of comingled 
groans, sighs, and cries, shoutings, stamping of 
feet and clapping of hands, that drowned out 
the voice of the leader in prayer, and compel- 



140 ECCE REGNUM. 



led him to stop, though the clamor increased, 
and everything rattled and roared, as in a storm. 
We protest, religion is not noise, though noise 
may accompany it. A true revival of religion 
is not man's work but God's, and as it is His, 
it must be perfect, aud as it is perfect, there 
must be something very beautiful about it. We 
believe that when God works without hin- 
derance, all disorder and eccentricity is ruled 
out, Sis mighty power proceeds without noise, 
and evolves harmonious and symmetrica lforms. 
We see this as he works in creation and provi- 
dence. How silently life starts in the veget- 
able and animal world, how beautifully it 
is sustained and developed, how softly comes 
the light, how gently falls the dew, how 
still the movements of the planets, how 
wonderful the silence of God. As in crea- 
tion and providence, so in redemption, God 
is noiseless and gentle. He comes as the 
wind, diffuses as the light, sustains like gravi- 
tation, so that there is no disturbance, unless 
some foreign element, like sin, comes in the way. 
Stubborn wills that will not bend must break, 



REVIVAL. 



141 



evil doers that cannot bear the light must be 
scattered. 

In conviction of sin, there is trouble ; in resist- 
ance to the Spirit, misery, but in submission, rest; 
in faith, peace. Charge not, then, irregularity 
and disorder upon the Creator, but rather to 
sin and imperfection in the creature, and let 
stony hearts break, and the saints on earth, 
and the angels in heaven, who rejoice over one 
sinner that repenteth, shout for joy. 

As respects, then, the Holy Ghost, * he has a 
real existence, and works by mighty power in 
the souls and bodies of men, from whence fol- 
low various experiences, even to ecstacy and 
rapture, reaching at last to complete redemp- 
tion. 

These experiences, though substantially the 
same, vary as to degree as apprehended by the 
believer himself, and in form as manifest to 
others. Temperament, education, circumstan- 
ces, and the plan of God as to the use He will 



* Does not the fact that the Holy Ghost touches the body as well as 
the soul account for the instant healing of the sick, also for the way 
drunkards are said to lose their appetite for strong drink 



142 ECCE REGNUM. 



make of His children in the temple He is build- 
ing, all unite to modify and give diversity and 
variety. There is one Spirit, but various de- 
grees of it with divers gifts. The Apostle Paul 
dwells upon this point in his First Epistle to 
the Corinthians. In the twelfth chapter he 
cites a large variety of gifts, graces and offices 
in the one Spirit and one Body of Christ, and 
as all of these are distributed among Christians 
in one form or another, they are all of use, 
and the least as well as the greatest of them are 
not to be despised. To be the foot in the body 
is honorabfe service. Doubtless there are those 
who as to joy and ecstacy would like to be 
caught up to the third Heaven, like the Apos- 
tle, and, because they have not the lively expe- 
rience of some Christians, they are now in doubt 
and sorrow. But while they desire the Apos- 
tle' s rapture, would they be willing to take his 
thorn, given of Satan to buffet him, and permit- 
ted of God possibly to keep him from Spiritual 
pride? And after all rapture, or not, could 
they give his testimony to the value of Chris- 
tian love as surpassing all other gifts, without 



REVIVAL. 143 



which, though we possessed them all, we should 
be as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. 
Possibly it is easier for some people to rise to 
the house-top on the wings* of ecstacy, than live 
the thirteenth chapter of Corinthians in the 
family, the Church or the State. Religion is a 
life, an every-day life ; it makes men kind, is 
not easily provoked, enters into all of our rela- 
tions ; energizes and controls all of our work, 
regulates our intercourse with our neighbors, 
sustains us under sufferings, and gives us 
power against temptation. As long as we are 
in this world it is mainly valuable to this ordi- 
nary daily routine. Rapture gives us foretastes 
of resurrection power, but love fits us to be 
useful to our fellow-men and live in the \rorld. 
The fact is, we should not seek for wonderful 
experiences but for Christ Himself in His per- 
son, offices, work and character ; having Kim 
we shall freely receive all spiritual blessings m 
His own time and way. He will keep us ":la 
perfect peace." As our minds arc stayed on 
Him we shall find sweet rest in His promises ; 



144 ECCE BEGNUM. 



joy at times may be unspeakable, and rapture 
at last, like a whirlwind, take us to Heaven. 

For we read, "That the Lord Himself shall 
descend from Heaven with a shout and the 
voice of the Archangel, and with the trump of 
God, and the dead in Christ shall rise first. 
Then we, which are alive and remain, shall 
be caught up together with them in the clouds 
to meet the Lord in the air ; and so shall we 
ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one 
another with these words."* 

Here is the 

DEATHLESS RAPTURE, 

Or the redemption of the body without death, 
and we notice how the Apostle Paul and the 
Christians at Thessalonica, are to comfort them- 
selves in the prospect of it. They are to be 
looking for the Lord to descend from heaven, 
and to take them up into the air. Their bodies 
are not to moulder in the grave, but they are 
to be changed " In a moment, in the twinkling 
of an eye, at the last trump, for the trumpet 

* 1 Thess. iv. 16, 17. 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE, 145 

shall sound and the dead shall be raised incor- 
ruptible, and we shall be changed.''* The 
Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the 
dead, can accomplish this in the bodies of the 
saints, and thus prove the words of Jesus to 
Martha, to be literally true.f That whosoever 
liveth and believeth on Him, shall never die. 
All of the saints who are alive on the earth, 
when Jesus comes, shall never die. We wish to 
dwell at some length upon this theme. And 
is it not proper, to inquire here, if the Chris- 
tians of the first century comforted themselves 
in the hope of a deathless rapture, at the com- 
ing of their Lord in the air, can any believer 
in this nineteenth, be charitably considered as 
having departed from the faith and become a 
fanatic, who looks for the same ecstatic transla- 
tion and glorious transfiguration \ It is thought 
by many that we have made great progress in 
a knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus, since 
Paul' s time, that we are wiser now, and there- 
fore it is, we suppose, that it is considered to be 
an improvement upon the old theology to-post- 

* 1 Cor. xv. 51. t John xi, 26. 



146 ECCE REGNUM. 



pone the coming of the Saviour, for a thousand 
years at least, and to be looking for the pale 
horse with his rider, death rather, than for 
the King of Grlory, mounted upon his white 
steed. Certain it is, that it has become un- 
popular to comfort Christians as did the Apos- 
tle the Thessalonians. Rev. John Robinson, 
the Puritan Father, is often quoted as expect- 
ing more light to break forth from God' s word, 
than was seen in his day ; but is this light that 
hangs a black pall, as it were, before the Sun of 
Righteousness ? Does not the Spirit bring Jesus 
near, even in advance of the King of Terrors, and 
make it possible for Christians of this genera- 
tion to go to Heaven without dying ? True, 
this may not be, but yet, the Scriptures com- 
mand us to " watch," and "be ready," and 
Jesus assures us, that we know not the day, nor 
the hour, when the Son of Man Cometh. He is 
"to come like a thief," come when people are 
not looking for Him, come when men are scoif- 
ing, and saying, "where is the promise of His 
coming?" Why, may He not come quickly? 
He has gone to prepare mansions for His peo- 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE. 147 

pie, and His word is, that He will come again, 
and receive them unto Himself, that where He 
is, there they may be also. His advent is cer- 
tain, the time is uncertain. 

But it is objected, that it is not Pauline 
to be looking for the literal personal coming 
of the Saviour, and therefore, for a death- 
less rapture as near. It is observed that 
though, in his First Epistle to the Thessalo- 
nians, the Apostle instructs the brethren to do 
so, yet in his Second, he seems to correct him- 
self, when he says, "Let no man deceive you 
by any means, for that day shall not come ex- 
cept there come a falling away first, and that 
Man of Sin be revealed — the Son of Perdition. ' ? * 
And he goes on to remark, that this Man of 
Sin, or Wicked One, cannot be revealed until 
something that hinders the mystery of iniquity 
which had already begun to work in his day 
should be removed. Here seems to be a diffi- 
culty, to be sure. 

But how did the words of the Apostle influ- 
ence the early Christians? Did they "change 

* 2d Thess. ii. 



148 ECCE REGNUM. 



tlieir belief ? Nay, for it is a matter of history 
that for the first three centuries they con- 
tinued to look for the coming of their Lord. 
Says Gibbon, "It was universally believed that 
the end of the world and the Kingdom of 
Heaven were at hand. The approach of this 
event had been predicted by the Apostles ; the 
tradition of it was preserved by their nearest 
disciples, and those who understood in their 
literal sense the discourses of Christ Himself, 
were obliged to expect the second and glorious 
coming of the Son of Man in the clouds before 
that generation was totally extinguished. * * 
As long as for wise purposes this error was 
permitted to subsist in the Church, it was pro- 
ductive of the most salutary effects on the faith 
and practice of Christians. The ancient and 
popular doctrine of the millenium was inti- 
mately connected with the second coming of 
Christ."* It is noticeable that here, though 
the distinguished historian himself looks upon 
the doctrine of the Second Advent as an 



* Hist. Evmc, chap. >?r, vol. 1, p£ e 332. 

Note.— For tho history of A he doctrine, see a work entitled " Marana- 
tha," by *,,s. H. Brooks, D. D. ; of St. Lo-is, chap. xvii. 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE. 149 

error, he acknowledges that Christ and His 
Apostles taught it as literal and near ; that 
the early Christians believed it and taught it, 
and that it was productive of good. It must 
be confessed that though an infidel, he is honest 
and manly here. Well, then, Gibbon believed 
that the Bible taught the speedy coming of the 
Lord : the early Christians believed it, many, 
very many, of Christ's followers ever since 
His ascension have been looking for His re- 
turn, and have died without the sight. Mr. 
Moody, the Evangelist of these days, testifies 
that every thirtieth verse of the New Testa- 
ment alludes to it directly or indirectly. Much 
of the learning of the Church from primitive 
times, down to the complete commentaries of 
Alford and Lange, is in this direction. Now, 
what shall we say to all this in face of the 
difficulty that the Apostle Paul seems to raise 
by causing an apostacy, a mysterious work of 
iniquity, a hinderer and the revelation of the 
Man of Sin to intervene ? We may say this, 
certainly, that it has been believed by respect- 
able persons that the Apostle has raised no 



150 ECCE REGNUM. 



serious difficulty, that in the language he used 
he never designed to mystify or necessarily 
present a distant view of Christ's personal ad- 
vent, but rather confirm and regulate Chris- 
tians in .their belief in it. Some one had been 
deceiving the Thessalonians by teaching that 
Christ had already come, and by tho use of a 
counterfeit letter purporting to come from Paul 
to this effect. This touched the root of their 
faith, and troubled them. So he writes some- 
thing that is revealed to him, something that 
he says he had told them before concerning 
certain events to transpire before the coming 
of Christ. He writes not concerning " times 
and seasons," and we may believe that of those 
he had no revelation. He may not have known 
when the apostacy would be ripe, when the 
Man of Sin would be revealed, any more than 
when the Son of Man would come. For aught 
he knew these events might be near, and come 
in his day rather than wait for more than 
eighteen hundred years. At all events, Jesus 
would come, come like a thief upon those that 
were in darkness and not looking for Him, 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE, 



151 



while to the brethren who were " children of 
the light," His coming would not be unex- 
pected; therefore they are exhorted "not to 
sleep, but watch and be sober, and put on the 
whole armor of God." It makes no difference 
about the Man of Sin whenUe is to be revealed. 
They are to look unto and for Jesus. They 
are to have Him always before their face, on 
their right hand and on their left. They are 
not to say, as to time, there is to be a thousand 
years before His advent, or that there will not 
be. Of the "times and seasons" he writes 
not. He exhorts to watch, wait, hope. "For 
God," he says, "hath not appointed us unto 
wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord 
Jesus Christ, who died for us, that whether we 
wake or sleep we should live together with 
Him." So, in substance, we find the Apostle 
writes confirming the brethren in the doctrine 
of the Second Advent by making it prominent 
and bringing it near, at the same time regula- 
ting their faith by citing intermediate events 
preparatory and incidental thereto, yet all as 
to time uncertain, so that for aught they could 



152 ECCE REGNUM. 



tell they all might happen in their own genera- 
tion. 

In this way he guards them against presump- 
tion on the one hand, and despair on the other. 
He gives them a calm, patient, hopeful, heav- 
enly Spirit. He makes them strong to do, re- 
sist, and suffer for the Master, and they learn 
of Him, as he had learned of the Lord, to teach, 
as Gibbon says, ' i that the the end of the world 
and the Kingdom of Heaven was at hand." In 
this respect, at least, are not all those of this 
generation, who teach the same, be they or- 
dained, or unordained, in the true line of suc- 
cession from the Apostles ? But suppose we 
depart from this primitive method and teach 
that the end of th ) world will not come until 
this world is converted to Christ, and the King- 
dom of God comes in a universal Christian 
civilization. Does this help us to solve the 
difficulty under consideration % Not at all. For 
the events which the Apostle notices as to ap- 
pear before the advent are all of apostacy, in- 
iquity, and sin. He sees no progress of the na- 
tural man, or the natural world into a perfect 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE. 153 

state. No power of impersonal ideas or unem- 
bodied, and so called spiritual principles, that 
conquer iniquity and bring a universal reign of 
righteousness and peace. No influence of the 
Holy Ghost, aside from the revelation of the 
glorified person of Christ, that brings the King- 
dom of Heaven as it was seen in its objective 
glory by the disciples on the Mount. It is a 
development of sin that he sees, whose law is 
death, out of which there can be no deliverance, 
but by a supernatural interposition of God, 
which brings a new creation. 

It is the working of lawlessness, the Adamic 
sinful nature in man ; the flesh that is not sub- 
ject to the law of God, neither, indeed, can be, 
and therefore must be destroyed that He sees. 
This must work like leaven and appear in insti- 
tutions, systems of philosophy, and govern- 
ment and gathering around persons, at last, 
come to a head in a personal Anti-Christ. Who 
shall exalt himself above all that is called God, 
" blaspheme His name," "make the earth 
tremble*" " shake kingdoms," and yet as the 
"son of perdition," be ''brought dawn to hell." 



154 ECCE REGNUM. 



" consumed," not by the gradual progress of 
Christianity, the preaching of the Gospel, and 
ecclesiastical and civil machinery, but u by the 
breath of his mouth and the brightness of 
Mis coming."* Instead of beholding the 
Church converting the world, it is more likely 
that the Apostle sees the world converting the 
Church, as through craft it takes away its 
spiritual power of godliness, and leaves it as a 
cold formal image, rigid on the one side, in the 
crust of superstition or pliable on the other, in 
the mud of rationalism. The Apostle alludes to 
something that hinders the working of " the 
mystery of iniquity," and keeps back the 
manifestation of the man of sin. What is this 
essentially, but the salt that keeps from cor- 
ruption, the Church, the mystical body of 
Christ, all regenerate persons. Let these die 
or like Elijah be translated, and what then 
would prevent the world from capturing all of 
the civil and ecclesiastical establishments, and 
turning them into the current of iniquity ? 
What then could hinder the appearance of a 



* Rev. xiii. 3-4-6. 2 Thess. ii. 4. Job xiv. 15-16. Danl. vii. 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE. 155 

man who with power to use these organiza- 
tions, should unite them in his own person as 
head of Church and State ? 

Perhaps it would be more proper to say the 
Holy Spirit, the " Savor" of the salt, is the 
hinderer ; essentially He is ; essentially the 
truth ; or Christian doctrine is essentially the 
Church ; but formally, politically it is the 
" net- work" of political governments. See 
Alf ord' s Commentary on Thessalonians. 

Swelling with pride and ambition, more able 
than any Caesar or Napoleon, more unscrupu- 
lous, selfish, and hypocritical than Judas, 
what should hinder this man from spreading 
himself like a green bay tree, aspiring to the 
place of God, and claiming divine honors ? 
See the Bible description of Anti-Christ, and 
consider if his character does not harmonize 
with a state of things such as would natur- 
ally come from an unrestrained development 
of human nature after the flesh; a develop- 
ment arrested for a time at the deluge, 
and typically, at least, at the tower of Ba- 
bel, in the destruction of Sodom and Go- 



156 ECCE REGNUM. 



morrah, and in the overthrow of Jerusalem ; 
a development that, centering in the persons 
of distinguished wicked men, in Church and 
State, has filled the world in all ages with 
many Anti-Christs ; a development that has 
not reached its maturity as yet, but is still 
working as the mystery of lawlessness through 
society, until it shall culminate in the great 
apostacy of the last days. 

Wherefore then, as the Apostle sees all of 
this, as Christ teaches it, where He compares the 
days of His coming to those of Noah, and as 
Paul also testifies to it, when he speaks of u evil 
men and seducers as waxing worse and worse ; 
deceiving and being deceived." Indeed, as the 
drift of Scripture is this way, how can we see 
any place for a millennium of righteousness 
and peace until the Lord comes ? If we a-dopt 
the theory that there is one, we obtain no 
light, solve no difficulty, harmonize no Scrip- 
ture ; on the contrary, we find ourselves join- 
ing with the evil servant in saying, ' ' the Lord 
delay eth His coming." We cry " peace, peace, 
when there is no peace," and wrest the Word 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE. 157 



of God from its exact connection ; so that pas- 
sages sucli as "Be ye also ready, for in such 
an hour as ye think not the Son of man 
cometh,"* must receive a fanciful interpreta- 
tion, and apply not to us in their true Second 
Advent sense ; but to some generation at least, 
a thousand years hence. 

Assuming that the Lord will not come again 
in the clouds even as He ascended until after 
the millennium, the doctrine becomes practi- 
cally of little consequence, and, therefore, is 
not studied or used. Death, and the interme- 
diate state occupy the place of the glorious, 
personal appearing, the deathless rapture and 
the resurrection. With this theory we should 
never think of comforting one another as did 
Paul the early Christians, with the prospect 
of ascending into the air with a body clothed 
upon from Heaven ;+ but we should exhort each 
other to get ready to die; to prepare to be un- 
clothed, and in a disembodied state rest in 
Abraham's bosom ; a condition of conscious 
blessedness to be sure, for we read, "Blessed 



* Matt. xxiv. 44. t Rev. xiv. 13. 



158 ECCE REGNUM. 



are the dead who die in the Lord," a state of 
rapture and beatific vision, indeed ; supposing 
Paul was out of the body when he was caught 
up to the third heaven and the thief was in 
Paradise, the day he died ; yet not the death- 
less glory that Paul was looking for, though he 
prophesied evil to the world and the manifesta- 
tion of the Man of sin before the advent of His 
Lord. The Apostle longed to go to heaven in 
the body, for he says that he would not be 
" unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality 
might be swallowed up of life."* This was the 
hope before him : the redemption of his body 
at the coming of Christ. He fought a good 
fight, and finished his course in the prospect of 
it ; and he did not expect his crown of right- 
eousness until ' ' that day. ' ' Eighteen hundred 
years have passed, and this day of the Lord' s 
appearing has not come. The Apostle is there- 
fore, still in the enjoyment of his hope of re- 
demption; his body rests in it, his crown of 
glory awaits its fulfillment in the coming of his 
Lord, who shall change his vile body and fash- 

* 2 Cor. t, 4. 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE. 159 

ion it after His glorious body. Though, blessed 
now as he rests from his labors in glad visions 
of his Saviour and the angels, and hears un- 
speakable words, yet he is not so happy as he 
will be, when he shall awake in His likeness, sit 
with Him on His throne, and with all of the 
saints reigns on the earth. 

As with Panl, so is it certainly with all those 
who love the appearing of the Saviour, be they 
on earth or in Paradise. They are blessed be- 
cause of the blessed hope. In Paradise, this 
hope is rapture unceasing, and not an uncon- 
scious sleep ; on earth it is joy and peace, 
under a sense of the divine glory in Christ, 
that rises or falls, stops or continues, according 
to the spiritual condition of the believer. It is a 
part of the Christian's experience, holds him 
like an anchor here, and entering within the 
veil abides with him there, until it is fulfilled 
at the appearing of the Lord in the resurrec- 
tion of the body. Should the Lord come before 
he dies, this experience becomes deathless rap- 
ture : the very fulness of that tide of bliss that 



160 ECCE REGNUM. 



awaits the saints who are now resting from 
their labors in the intermediate state. 

From the foregoing we perceive a bright con- 
tinuity in the blessed hope of the believer as 
in the links of a golden chain. Beginning on 
earth, it dissolves not with the body, but, pass- 
ing on, holds the disembodied spirit until the 
resurrection. The view that Christ does not 
come until after the millennium breaks this con- 
tinuity. Indeed, so far as Christians of the 
present generation are concerned, it does not 
allow them to hope at all for the redemption of 
the body without the condition of death and 
the intermediate state between. Death must 
come, it is certain, on this theory, for every 
generation of Christians for nine hundred years 
at least. They need not try to comfort them- 
selves with an Enoch translation. They need 
not say, " We that remain shall be caught up," 
for toe here has no application to them. They 
must die, sure, and not until then need they 
look for the redemption of the body. 

Christ's personal coming and the resurrec- 
tion from the dead is in the remote future, and 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE. 161 

therefore may be remotely considered. Other 
hopes fastening upon other objects ; hopes for 
the triumph of the Church and the improve- 
ment of the world in this dispensation ; hopes 
to be fulfilled through an extensive diffusion of 
ideas through civil and ecclesiastical reforms, 
and by the preaching of a gospel which is not 
the whole gospel ; these may be indulged and 
accepted as comforters rather than the hope 
of the deathless rapture at the coming of the 
Lord, wherewith Paul would comfort himself 
and his brethren in Thessalonica, Here we 
might pause with a comfortable assurance that- 
enough has already been said to prove that the 
postponement of the Lord's coming so far into 
the future that Christians of the present gene- 
ration cannot have the comfort of seeing it and 
experiencing its results in a deathless rapture 
is unscriptural and contrary to the faith once 
delivered to the saints. And as there is reason 
in believing the Bible, and in following the 
example of the early Christians as to belief, we 
might rest quietly, let who would call us fanati- 



162 ECCE REGNUM. 



cal. But the subject is so interesting we will 
pursue it further. 

There are abundant reasons for indulging 
in the blessed hope of redemption without 
death. Perhaps more w x ill appear if we ad- 
vert to the theory of the two stages in the 
Advent held by some very wise and good 
men of these days. According to this, when 
we speak of the Lord's first coming, we do not 
refer simply to the moment that He was born 
in the manger, but we include the years of His 
life here on the earth. We refer to a period 
of time. 

Now let us regard His Second Advent in the 
same way, and believe that He is to appear 
first to His saints and to them alone. He 
comes for them ; they are waiting for Him ; 
they love His appearing. In view of it they 
have lived in the world as not of it ; pilgrims 
and strangers here, they have felt that Heaven 
is their home ; they have studied " to be quiet 
and do their own business ; " they have 
occupied with their talents and gifts. Under 
every form of government, and among all 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE. 163 

nations, we see them faithful in their various 
callings, contented with their lot, willing to do 
or suffer for Christ's sake, laying up for 
themselves treasure in Heaven, The day ap- 
proaches and the Lord appears to them alone ; 
two persons are grinding at the mill, one is 
taken and the other left ; two are in one bed, 
one is taken and the other left ; they are about 
their work or about their sleep. We do not 
think of them as knowing the time and gather- 
ing together in white cotton robes for an ascen- 
sion. The spirit of the Judge who on a mem- 
orable dark day was informed that the Judg- 
ment had come, and that it was time to adjourn 
the Court, who yet ordered the lamps lighted 
that he might be about his duty, is rather to 
be commended than the foolishness that has 
been committed by some good but ignorant 
people in view of the day of rapture. The 
command of the Saviour to all of His disciples 
is, '* Occupy till I come" 

The Lord does come, and the saints are 
caught up to be forever with him ; they are 
stolen away from friends and neighbors, for 



JL 



164 ECCE REGNUM. 



the Lord has come as a thief. He has been in 
and out, and " the good man of the honse " did 
not observe it. Those who are left behind miss 
their friends, bnt they did not see them go 
any more than the men who were on the way 
to Damascus with Saul of Tarsus saw what he 
saw, or heard the words he heard. They note 
the results of his appearing, and they wonder. 
But as there is some Professor about who can 
explain the whole thing, or, peradventure, if 
he is not able, the Spiritualists can, and then 
as common sense teaches us to be resigned to 
the loss of our friends, no matter how they go, 
and then as we never can understand these 
mysterious things that are so much in the line 
of progress and in keeping with the spirit of 
the age, and now as the cars are coming and 
business is pressing, and we are in a hurry 
and time passes on, the wonder is forgotten. 

We know how it was, when Jesus came the 
first time, at Bethlehem. The angels knew it, 
and they sang glory to God in the highest, 
on earth peace and good will to men. They 
told the news to the shepherds who watched 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE 165 

their flocks by night on the hills, and they 
went to the place where the infant Saviour lay, 
and then told the story about the streets. But 
what did the people do ? The record is they 
"wondered"* but the current theme was taxes 
and politics, and the marvellous thing was 
soon forgotten. Has it not ever been so with 
the masses, always ready to wonder, but slow 
to believe and worship ? Only here and there, 
comparatively, are the Simeons and Annas who 
discern the supernatural and divine glory. 

Not only are saints who are alive on the 
earth at this stage of the Lord 5 s coming taken, 
but the righteous dead are raised from their 
graves. This is the first resurrection, to which 
the Apostle John refers in the Apocalypse, and 
to which the Apostle Paul, if he should die, 
desired to attain. This is a resurrection from 
the dead.j- Those that remain in their graves, 
that is, the wicked, are not raised for a thou- 
sand years, not until the close of the millen- 
nium, when they have a second death, fearful 
to contemplate as represented in the Word of 

* Luke ii. 18. t Rev. xx. 6. 



166 ECCE REGNUM. 



God. But blessed, we are told, are all they 
who have part in the first resurrection, and 
therefore it is unto this, through the Saviour, 
we should look. We see now the advent of Jesus 
as the Bright and Morning Star. He conies 
softly, gently out of the night, and stands just 
at the gray dawn, unperceived by only those 
who are up early and waiting for Him. To all 
these He is a magnet of power, drawing them 
up to Himself ; henceforth they are forever 
with Him as His bride, the Church. As such 
they are now in Heaven, where the Apostle 
John sees them under the symbol of the four 
and twenty elders, and four living beasts, and 
where He hears them sing this song, as they 
stand in the presence of their Redeemer : 
"Thou art worthy to take the book and open 
the seals thereof : for Thou wast slain and hast 
redeemed us by Thy blood out of every kin- 
dred and tongue and people and nation, and 
hast made us unto God, kings and priests, and 
we shall reign on the earthy* These risen 
and glorified saints, then, are to have some- 

* Rev. v, 9-10. 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE 167 

thing to do on this earth again ; they have not 
left it forever. Accordingly, after the mar- 
riage in Heaven, we see them coming with 
Christ. He comes now as the sun in full orbed 
glory. Heaven is opened, and He whose name 
is Faithful and True comes forth upon His 
white horse to judge and make war, the armies 
of Heaven following. This is the second stage 
of the Lord's coming. Now the nations are 
aroused, and they see the Man of Sorrows in 
all the glory of His Father, angels and saints 
with Him ; not that in every quarter of the 
globe He is seen at the same moment, but in 
due time every eye shall see Him, every one 
shall be judged. The Lord descends in the 
same manner in which He ascended in the 
clouds. He comes to the same place. His feet 
stand upon Mount Olives. He has come to make 
war against all of His foes and the foes of His 
people, Israel, with whom He has made an ever- 
lasting covenant. He therefore draws His sword 
in the Valley of Decision. He smites Anti- 
christ and his followers at Armageddon. He 
delivers Israel from the hand of the oppressor. 



168 ECCE REGNUM. 



He takes possession of David's throne. Ap- 
pearing "in His glory He builds up Zion,"* 
makes Jerusalem the metropolis of the earth 
and Israel a blessing to all of the nations. 
Henceforth Christ is the Universal King, King 
and Priest, as Church and State are united, 
"King of Kings and Lord of Lords," and the 
saints are kings and priests with Him and they 
reign on the earth. Having overcome, through 
the blood, they sit with Him on His throne, 
even as He has sat in Heaven on the Father' s 
throne. 

We have, as regards the Advent, then, two 
stages, with an interval between ; during this 
interval the Church is seen in Heaven. There 
is now no salt in the earth, and lawlessness un- 
hindered can work. Noah is in the ark. Lot 
is out of Sodom. The political governments, 
instituted to serve Christ, no longer hinder the 
development of evil, for there are no good men 
to administer them. The rulers are all against 
the Anointed One, and break the bands by 
which He restrains them. They take council 

Ps. cii, 16. 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE. 169 

against Him, and cast away His cords from 
them. The people have declared themselves 
independent, claiming for themselves the right 
to do as they please. The Lord, who sits in 
the heavens, laughs at the pride that exalts 
itself to be as G-od, and looking down and see- 
ing a state of things as in the days of Noah, 
waits awhile that the last experiment of build- 
ing the tower and securing perfection, freedom, 
happiness, or Heaven without Him may be 
tried. In undertaking to climb up some other 
way than through Christ, the nations shall be 
allowed to see how far they can go. The spirit 
of lawlessness that is in them by nature may 
proceed as follows: rejecting Christ, the peo- 
ple start off on the line of liberalism towards 
self-government, but they fail for the want of 
virtue ; there can be no virtue without Christ. 
The plunge, then, is into anarchy, out of which 
they seek to be delivered by calling upon the 
strongest man and giving him unlimited power. 
This man proves to be Antichrist, and there is 
a reaction to despotism. But during this time 
it has come to pass that Palestine is in posses- 



170 ECCE REGNUM. 



sion of the Jews. These people have returned 
thither with their great wealth, and rebuilt 
their city, and holding to the Old Testament, 
in their way have restored the temple. The 
land of Israel is now a place to be coveted. So 
Antichrist, at the head of the nations of the 
prophetic earth — that is, all of those included 
in the territory of old Rome — enters it and 
lays siege to Jersusalem. For many centuries 
Israel has been drinking the cup of God's 
wrath, but now they drink it to the dregs. It 
is a time of great tribulation. It is predicted 
in the twenty-fourth chapter of Matthew's 
Gospel. But the Lord remembers His cove- 
nant with the fathers, with the patriarchs, and 
with David, and though he chastens He does 
not utterly forsake His people. There is an 
elect remnant, and as the Lord appears in the 
clouds of Heaven to the discomfiture of Anti- 
christ and his followers, these are smitten as 
Saul of Tarsus was on his w^ay to Damascus. 
They look upon Him, the nation pierced, and 
turn with repentence and mourning. Did God 
bless Saul and make him a power in the earth ? 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE. 



171 



So does He bless penitent Israel. As we liave 
seen He becomes their King. We have only 
to open our Bibles and read the Prophets con- 
cerning their restoration to see how abundant 
shall be their prosperity. They will be the 
greatest community in the earth, and people of 
other nations will take hold of their skirts and 
be glad to go along with them. Therefore, as 
now we see them scattered, we are restrained 
from despising them or boasting. According 
to the Apostle Paul they are the "good olive 
tree," while Gentiles are but branches of a 
"wild olive tree," grafted in. They are the 
natural branches cut off for a season for their 
sins, " but if they abide not in unbelief shall 
be grafted in ; for God is able to graft them in 
again." Not only is God able, but He will 
restore them, for it is written in the verses fol- 
lowing : " There shall come out of Zion the 
Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness 
from Jacob, for this is My covenant unto them 
when I shall take away their sins. ' ' * Evidently 
the time between the two stages of the Advent 



* Ro. xi, 26-27. 



172 ECCE REGNUM. 



is a very eventful period in history. Brief, 
like the distance between the morning star and 
the rising of the sun, but crowded full of won- 
derful events. Because of vast material pro- 
gress, knowledge runs to and fro ; the move- 
ment is intensely rapid, and the days seem 
shortened. 

It is the last stretch on the down grade of a 
wicked world's race, and the momentum is 
great and the wheels fly swiftly. It is the swell- 
ing of that pride that goeth before destruction 
and the nervous twitches of that haughty spirit 
that precedes a fall. Dean Alford, who com- 
ments somewhat in a similar strain, on the im- 
port of chap. 2, 1-12, of 2d Thessalonians, re- 
marks, "if it be said that this is a somewhat 
dark view to take of the prospects of mankind, 
we may answer first, that we are not speculat- 
ing on the phenomena of the world, but we are 
interpreting God's word: secondly that we 
believe in One in whose hands all evil is working 
for good, with whom there are no accidents 
nor failures, and who is bringing out of all 
this struggle, which shall mould and measure 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE. 



173 



the history of the world* the ultimate good of 
. man and the glorification of his boundless love 
in Christ; and thirdly, that no prospect is 
dark for those who believe in Him. For them 
all things are working together for good, and 
in the midst of the struggle itself, they know 
that every event is their gain ; every apparent 
defeat real success, and even the last dread 
conflict, the herald of victory, in which all who 
have striven on God's part shall have a glori- 
ous and everlasting share." But whatever 
aspect the theory under consideration may put 
upon the face of this world's history, we are 
certainly by it thrust back to the Scriptural 
position of uncertainty, with respect to the 
Lord's coming. The same that the early Chris- 
tians occupied. According to it, we may expect 
the Lord in the first stage of His coming as the 
Bright and Morning Star, any time, though we 
postpone that peculiar phase of His Advent as 
the Sun. "We have a place also for the develop- 
ment of the Apostacy and the manifestation of 
Antichrist, and we understand what it is that 
essentially hinders the working of lawlessness. 



174 ECCE EEGNUM. 



Somehow, this view tKrows light upon other- 
wise dark passages of Scripture. The impreca- 
tory psalms, for instance, out of place in the 
mouths of the disciples of Him who prayed for 
His enemies, and exhorted His followers to do 
so, seem not unnatural as the language of the 
Jews under the persecutions of Antichrist. 
There are Messianic psalms, and these are un- 
derstood clearly when we behold Christ as King 
in Zion, on the throne of His father David, 
reigning over Jacob. So the imprecatory psalms 
have a meaning that we do not consider unless 
we see the period of the Great Tribulation. 

There are prayers in these psalms that the 
Jews can make ; that they will have a right in 
their peculiar circumstances to make ; prayers 
that the Lord will answer, as for instance, in 
the Eighty-third Psalm, "Let them be con- 
founded and troubled forever, yea, let them be 
put to shame and perish, that men may know 
that Thou, whose name alone is Jehovah, art 
the Most High over all the earth." 

This view also assists us in the study of the 
prophecies — Old Testament and New. It sheds 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE, 175 

light upon the Book of Revelation. The inter- 
val between the two stages gives ns a place for 
seals, trumpets and vials ; and in Antichrist 
we see one beast at least. At all events, since 
the theory touched our thought, we have not 
been so discouraged with the mysterious book. 

No doubt, there is a great mine of wisdom in 
it and a blessing on him who can understand 
it. Right here it may be, that Father Robin- 
son' s light is to break forth, illuminating Es- 
chatology or the doctrine of the last times. It 
is upon this subject that we need light cer- 
tainly. Other doctrines, as the Trinity and 
the sinfulness of man, the Atonement, etc., 
have been quite thoroughly discussed and 
clearly stated, insomuch that it is a question 
whether there has been any progress in Theo- 
logy for the last three hundred years. * 

When we consider that human speculation is 
not theology, but, like God Himself, the science 
is supernatural, and therefore, does not change, 
however much it is picked to pieces ; there 
may be reason that there has been no pro- 

* See Macaulay's Essay on Ranke's History of the Popes 



176 ECCE REGNUM. 



gress. There was none, certainly, in the 
Middle Ages but into darkness ; and then 
at the time of the Reformation, the light 
broke forth in the truth preached by Luther. 
But what was the truth ? Nothing but the old 
Gospel, that had been buried under the rub- 
bish of scholastic subtleties, ritualistic obser- 
vances, and pagan mummeries. The simple 
doctrine of salvation through Christ alone, jus- 
tification by faith or Jesus only, and, what logic- 
ally followed therefrom, was the substance of 
it. The old truth broke from God's Word. It 
was nothing new, but it was Apostolic doc- 
trine, primitive Christianity, Pauline purity, 
and the simplicity of the truth in Christ re- 
vived. The Reformation was a revival. Pro- 
gress was made by going back to what the 
early Christians held, and bringing it forth ; 
and if now there was a revival of Christian doc- 
trine after the primitive pattern, we should see 
the glorious appearing of the Saviour and the 
consequent deathless rapture of the Saints 
brought to the front. 
The early Christians aside ; all human specu- 



BE A THLESS RAPTURE. 177 



lation, and our own words as forgotten, this is 
certainly, where the grace of God places them. 
He that runs may read the words of the Holy 
Ghost, as Paul writes them to Titus. 

"The grace of God that bringeth salvation 
hath appeared to all men, teaching us that de- 
nying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should 
live soberly, righteously and godly, in this 
present world ; looking for that Messed hope 
and the glorious appearing of the great God 
and our Saviour, Jesus Christ"* According to 
this, to be looking for the Saviour is as much 
a part of the Christian life as sobriety and 
godliness. And is it not here that the Word 
opens and the light shines % What is the 
truth ? If we are to make progress in the- 
ology and find it, is it not by going back to the 
first century, referring to the faith once de- 
livered to the saints and becoming more Paul- 
ine % It may be objected that this is progress 
backward. It doubtless is to all those who 
have gone astray, and to this, all are liable. 
There is so much fog ; so many winds of doc- 

* Titus ii, 12, 13. 



178 ECCE REGNUM. 



trine blowing ; so many rocks ahead ; that we 
must ever be looking to the points that are 
fixed and sure, and so make our reckoning. 
We must ever recur to first principles ; they 
are as important to the theologian in his 
sphere as to the scientist in his, and we may 
be sure that they center in Christ's glorious per- 
son, and have a tendency to draw us to Him as 
the sun starts vegetation upward. In Him, 
they are not cold formal abstractions, but light 
and heat, spirit and power ; and assure us of 
His presence ; and, that we are making our 
way safely. 

Though in this ' dispensation it is night, 
clouds are over us and breakers are ahead, yet 
the San is in his place ready to be revealed in 
the morning. Are we not to remember this in 
the night, and so make our latitude and longi- 
tude accordingly ; or are we to forget that there 
is a great centre of attraction and so drift 
away upon our fancies into "a wide sea of hy- 
pothesis and conjecture?" We believe that 
some things in this world are settled. The truth 
as it is in Jesus is an everlasting rock that rises 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE. 179 



to the surface in a chain of mountain peaks. 
These are clearly seen in their order, while all 
that lies between, in forest and rock, hill and 
valley, may not be discovered. 

The Incarnation, Crucifixion, Resurrection, 
Ascension, and Second Advent of Jesus, rise in 
the spiritual landscape as in a living range ; 
they are all connected with and spring from 
His Divine person, and so are radiant in the 
light of the Transfiguration. 

As we look at them towering aloft, a thousand 
truths that may lie between their summits, do 
not draw our attention, we may even forget in 
sight of the resurrection that we may die. 
The intermediate state may seem as a beautiful 
valley in a light blue haze, now under shadow 
and now under sun, in the presence of the Sec- 
ond Glorious Appearing that stands against 
the sky in well defined outline. 

Indeed, suppose all theories are inadequate 
to explain the connection of divine truth, yet 
we must acknowledge the prominent doctrines 
are distinctively revealed in a certain order 
which must ever stand firm. So then after the 



180 ECCE REGNUM. 



ascension, and the session in Heaven, comes the 
Second Advent with the deathless rapture and 
the first resurrection, and then on the green 
hillsides and beautiful valleys of Palestine 
tilled by restored and exalted Israel, resting 
under the care of the Good Shepherd, and more 
extensively after awhile over the whole earth, 
spreading like a sea of glory from pole to pole, 
lies the Millennium. 

We plead, then, for a revival of Christian 
doctrine in its divine order, and for an adjust- 
ment of theories touching the connection of 
this doctrine to this order. The theory we 
have considered is so adjusted. It therefore 
harmonizes Scripture, and does not deprive 
Christians of this generation of the blessed 
hope of meeting the Lord in the air. 

Could we only get rid of the ideas we have 
imbibed from childhood concerning the coming 
of Christ, as of necessity, in all of its phases, 
like the descent of a thunder storm down upon 
us "amid the wreck of matter and the crash 
of worlds," desolation following in its track, 
the righteous and the wicked rising simulta- 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE. 181 

neously. Could we believe in days that are 
years and dispensations, and see that the Bible 
in its concise mode of expression covers some- 
times in a sentence periods of time in such a 
way as to make events w^ide apart seem as 
joined in close connection, (e. g., Isa. lxi, 2.) 
Could we enter in through whatever joy we 
may have in the Lord into faith in the rapture 
of Enoch and Elijah and into the third Heaven 
experience of the Apostle Paul as possibly 
being in the body. Could w^e consider that what 
has been is likely to occur again, and that the 
age we live in has not passed by any degree 
of culture or refinement beyond the need of 
supernatural interpositions from God as visible 
and manifest as any that have transpired. 
Could we see the literal fulfillment of prophecy 
in the future, as well as in the past ; the res- 
toration of the Jews to their own land as 
clearly as their dispersion among the nations 
of the earth. In a word, could we adjust our- 
selves to the theory then we might be in a posi- 
tion to see the light break from God's Word 



182 ECCE REGNUM. 

and shine upon our path until the day dawn 
and the Bright and Morning Star appear. 

In noticing the theory of two stages in the 
Advent we ask nothing for it beyond its merits. 
Theories are human, and we may hold them 
loosely. But facts are divine, and to these we 
must cling, therefore we say, all theories aside, 
that the eternal fact remains that the Bible 
teaches clearly the Second Advent of Christ to 
this earth, and a deathless rapture of the saints 
who are alive at that time ; and this in a certain 
divine order that brings it before any millen- 
nium of righteousness and peace, and makes it 
the blessed hope of every generation of Chris- 
tians. 

Nothing can be plainer than this, the views of 
many good brethren to the contrary. Where- 
fore we plead for a return to the simplicity of 
Scripture, and to the faith once delivered to the 
saints. We ask for a whole Gospel, not for the 
atonement alone, but the resurrection ; not 
merely for the first coming of Christ to suffer, 
but for His Second Advent to reign. 

The Gospel in that complete wisdom and 



T 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE 183 

power that is unto salvation goes on two feet ; 
"the sufferings of Christ and the glories that 
are to follow," — the great theme of the Prophets 
and the Apostles. Says Spurgeon, u In old 
times the resurrection was preached by the 
Apostles as almost the sum and substance of 
the Gospel." Wherever Paul went we hear 
that he spake concerning the resurrection of the 
dead and then "some mocked." How is it 
now? Well did a good deacon once testify 
against a partial Gospel when he placed in front 
of the pulpit and behind the communion table 
the motto, " Christ is risen" thereby remind- 
ing the brethren that the Lord' s Supper is not 
only a memorial of His death, but a pledge that 
He is alive for evermore, and that He is coming 
again. "We show forth His death until He 
comes," says the Apostle. We eat the bread 
and drink the wine in the faith of His glorious 
appearing and in view of the resurrection of the 
body connected therewith we share in the glad 
triumph and shout : " Oh ! death where is thy 
sting ; oh ! grave where is thy victory ? " 
Is it strength, is it courage that we need ? then 



184 ECCE REGNUM. 



let us have theories of Christian truth that in- 
volve a whole Gospel and thus bring a risen 
glorilied Saviour personally near— so near that 
He will be a reality to us, and we be able as we 
walk to talk to Him as well as about Him. 
"To be spiritually minded," says Paul, "is 
life and peace." Why, seeing that the age 
of miracles has not yet passed may it not be 
deathless rapture as well ? Enoch walked with 
God, and he was not for God took him. Why 
if Christians had his faith could they not be 
translated? We hear much of a "Higher 
Christian Life." What is it if it is not getting 
nearer to Christ by faith and living in a sphere 
of influence above the sights and sounds of the 
world. Truly, all Christians may draw nearer 
to God than they do, but if they do this it will 
be by the influence of the truth, the whole truth 
as it is in Jesus. It will be by feeling the 
power of Christ' s resurrection, as well as by en- 
tering into fellowship with His sufferings. It 
will be by beholding His glory as King and 
risen Saviour, as well as seeing Him as the man 
of sorrows. We cannot take partial truth and 



DEATHLESS RAPTURE. 185 



get a clear experience of a present and full sal- 
vation. Somehow the sufferings and glories 
are so blended in the person of the Eedeemer 
that it is not sorrow alone, or majesty alone, 
that we see, but a certain " majestic sweetness" 
that is so overpowering in its attractiveness as 
to make Him the Chief among ten thousand 
and the One altogether lovely. Beholding Him 
as He really is, as do all of the angels of God, 
we worship Him. We " crown Him Lord of 
all," and if we feel happy in the thought that 
" He has borne our sins in his own body on the 
tree," we also comfort ourselves as did the early 
Christians in the hope of His glorious appear- 
ing and in the prospect of going to Heaven 
without dying. 



" Jesus hail ! enthroned in glory, 

These forever to abide ! 
All the heavenly host adore Thee, 

Seated at Thy Father's side. 
There for. sinners Thou art pleading ; 

Ever for us interceding, 
Till in glory we appear. 



186 ECCE REGNUM. 



Worship, honor, power and blessing, 

Thou art worthy to receive, 
Loudest praises without ceasing, 

Meet it is for us to give. 
Help, ye bright angelic Spirits, 

Bring your noblest, sweetest lays ! 
Help to sing our Saviour's merits, 

Help to chant Immanuers praise." 



THE NEW CREATION. 

We seem now, naturally, to pass from the re- 
demption of the body and kindred phenomena, 
into another manifestation of the power of 
God, viz., the deliverance of the material cre- 
ation from the bondage of corruption. 

The Apostle Paul, in the eighth of Romans, 
represents creation as it is now, groaning and 
travailing in pain, and waiting for a deliver- 
ance that is to come at the redemption of the 
body. To his mind, redemption is not com- 
plete until creation that is cursed on account 
of sin, is relieved. He binds it up, so to speak, 
in the same bundle of glory with the body, and 
sees it shining by supernatural light. It is 



THE NEW CREATION. 187 



that ' ' restitution of all things which God hath 
spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets 
since the world began. ' ' * It is the new heavens 
and new earth of Isaiah, Peter, and John.f It 
is Paradise restored, and everything good as at 
the beginning. He beholds the same power, 
that changes the vile bodies of the saints into a 
likeness to the glorious body of their Lord ; 
subduing all other things, and producing a uni- 
versal transfiguration : the aerial heavens above, 
pure and white, the earth beneath glowing in 
light. 

The beloved disciple, while an exile on Pat- 
mos, had a revelation of the Author of this 
new creation, and as he saw Him seated upon 
the throne, he heard Him say, "Behold, I make 
all things new"% 

Here we understand the extent of the new 
creation — all things. A new heaven and a new 
earth, at least. Says ^one as ' ' the third heaven, 
that holy, happy place," where God resides, 
does not need to be renewed, and as far as we 

* Rom. viii ; Acts iii. t fea. lxv, 17-25 ; Ixvi, 22. 2 Pet. iii, 10-13. J Rev. 

xxi, 5. 



ECCE REGNUM. 



know the firmament, the sun, moon and stars 
are all right, we may limit it to the atmos- 
phere and the earth we dwell on. 
Now, it is objected right here 

" That the great globe itself * * shall dissolve, 
And like the baseless fabric of a vision, 
Leave not a rack behind." 

So Shakspeare says. But Solomon says that 
" the earth abideth forever." Speaking by in- 
spiration of God, he gives us the truth, and 
therefore a basis upon which we are to deter- 
mine the meaning of all other passages of 
Scripture that have reference to the earth's 
duration. Interpreted thus they come into 
harmony, and give us not destruction alone, 
but a new creation ; not decline and ruin only, 
but glory following. The Phoenix rises from 
its ashes, life springs from death, aeon follows 
aeon or dispensation dispensation. Changes 
come. The fashion of this world passeth away. 
The Cosmos, the order within, the things that 
are in the earth, the works that are therein, 
even the elements of the earth, air and sea, 



THE NEW CREATION. 189 

burn, melt and fuse, but tlie globe itself stands 
strong. 

When Christ says that the Gospel must be 
preached for a witness to all nations, then 
cometh the end, He means the end of the 
age or dispensation — aeon. When Peter says 
that the earth and the works that are therein 
shall be burned up, he refers to the Cosmos, 
and considering the context that alludes to 
Noah' s flood, we see that it is by a deluge of 
fire* that the world perishes, even as of old it 
perished by water. As the water did not anni- 
hilate the globe, so shall not the fire ; rather it 
shall purify and remove the curse, so that the 
dross purged away, an age of gold or perfection 
appears. Our God is a consuming fire. He 
that makes all things new sits, according to 
Malachi, as a refiner and purifier. + He under- 
stands the essence of all things, and therefore 
can change their nature as well as their form. 
He is not simply a reformer, but a creator. 
His work is not a whitewash of the surface, but 
a regeneration. He gives a new heart, a neio 

* 2 Peter, iii. t Mat. iil, 3. 



190 ECCE REGNUM. 



body, a New Jerusalem, and a new heaven and 
a new earth. These are some of the creations 
that He gives His people for nothing. They 
all come out of the refiner's furnace in the per- 
fection of beauty, with a value best expressed 
by the words, "an eternal and exceeding 
weight of glory. "* For this Creation has been 
sighing during the past six thousand years — 
perfection, all things good as at the begin- 
ning. As the sick, groaning under pain, cry 
out for health, so does this poor, diseased 
world long for relief. Like the woman in the 
Gospel, she has employed many physicians, 
but as her disease is sin and death, her case 
has baffled all of their skill, and she has grown 
worse instead of better. The Great Physician 
has come with a remedy for all of her sin, and 
all of the consequences thereof, and under this 
dispensation of the Spirit offers it freely ; but 
in this day of grace He is rejected. Not a na- 
tion, not a village in all the world has received 
Him as yet. 
The words of the Evangelical Prophet are lit- 

* 2 Cor. iv, 17. 



THE NEW CREATION. 191 

erally fulfilled, " He is despised and rejected of 
men." A few receive him — a little flock, and 
experience His healing power and rejoice in 
His mercy and in the prospect of complete de- 
liverance, but the nations at large seem to turn 
away from Him and are trying to work out per- 
fection for themselves in their own way. ' ' There 
is a way," we are told, "that seemeth right to 
a man ; but the end thereof are the ways of 
death. ' ' * However, ' ' all things ' ' are the Lord' s 
by creation and redemption. Christ has pur- 
chased them with His blood. So if grace will 
not conquer judgment must. Following this 
day of grace, then comes one called the day of 
Judgment. God' s judgments ever since the fall 
of man have been in the earth, but there is a 
special time called the Day. Not twenty-four 
hours simply, but a period of time, or a dispen- 
sation. " One day is with the Lord as a thou- 
sand years and a thousand years as one day.f 
It is an age of a thousand years, or the time when 
Christ reigns on the earth or judges the nations. 
The millennium ushered in by the coming of 

* Prov. xvi. 25. t 2 Peter, iii. 



192 ECCE REGNUM. 



Christ and His saints, and closed with destruc- 
tion upon Gog and Magog, the beast and the 
false prophet, the Devil and his angels ; all 
the wicked with death and hell in the lake of 
fire, that terrible symbol of God' s wrath against 
all ungodliness. 

So perfection conies progressively through 
destructions and new creations. Judgment be- 
gins and goes on and a new creation follows. 
It begins at the House of God that is at Jeru- 
salem. The earthly city is judged and rebuilt 
and made the habitation of the heavenly that 
is of the church. When the Lord appears in 
His glory, we are told that u He builds up 
Zion." Could God of old dwell in the taber- 
nacle and temple as the Shekinah, then Christ 
and His Saints, one glorified body, may take 
up their abode at Jerusalem, and thus make it 
really the Holy City. The Heavenly City will 
come down into the earthly, purify and trans- 
figure it. The glory of the Lord will fill it, and 
so there will be no need of the light of the sun 
or the moon to shine in it 

We here see the spiritual and the material 



THE NEW CREATION. 193 

cities joined in one, even as the temple and the 
glory of the Lord that was within it. The ma- 
terial may be of gold and precious stones, as 
seen by the Apostle John, but these though 
real but symbolize the perfections of the spir- 
itual. So far as Jerusalem is concerned, at the 
commencement ot the millennium ' ' Christ is all 
and in all," but so far as regards the earth uni- 
versally, He is not so until the end of the thou- 
sand years, when all wickedness is judged in 
the lake, and thenceforth the solid globe itself, 
with all there is upon it, is transfigured and shin- 
ing in the light of the glory of God speeds on 
its course through the age of ages ; the centre 
perhaps of a universal government reaching be- 
yond the planets, as glorified Jerusalem will be 
the centre of Christ's administrations on the 
earth during the millennium. This view gives 
us the transfiguration instead of the absolute 
annihilation of matter, but in adopting it we 
feel that we are not following cunningly devised 
fables. We are rather in sight of the mount ; 
we are hold of spiritual realities, and should 



" 



194 ECCE REGNUM. 

not let go our grasp. We understand the new 
creation in the light of the transfiguration. 

The bodies of Moses and Elijah were once 
matter. They were material and perishable, 
but as seen on the Mount the same bodies there 
are spiritual and incorruptible. 

They are fashioned after Christ's glorious 
body. Their glory is not their own but His. 
He is in Moses and Elijah, and He is all unto 
them. When the Jews, at the foot of the Mount, 
behold them they see only one body essentially, 
though three members. They are all one. 
Christ is all and in all, and it is His glory that 
fills all and is seen all around. It is here that 
we see the regeneration of men in perfection 
give us the regeneration of "-all things" and 
they are made new, that is, they are glori- 
fied or transfigured. ' ' Behold, ' ' says the Lord, 
" I make all things new." That is, he subdues 
all things unto Himself, so that the whole cre- 
ation shall be glorified in Him. Behold ! see 
the new creation objectively. Only believe and 
we see the glory of God, See it first at Jeru- 
salem. Afterwards, and at the close of the mil- 



THE NEW CREATION. 195 



lennium, flooding the whole earth and heavens, 
Christ being all and in all. 

So, perfection or redemption comes after dis- 
pensations through the administration of Jesus 
Christ. The millennium is not perf ectlon abso- 
lutely, but only relatively, r.s compared with 
other dispensations, as the present one of the 
Spirit, Yet we speak of it as perfection for in 
it is the glory of God, and by means of -it and 
at its close it comes in its fullness. As we have 
observed, the millennium is the time of the judg- 
ment, the time of the personal reign of Christ 
and His Saints, wherein, through supernatural 
destructions and creations, He ultimately " sub- 
dues all things to Himself," u and when all 
things shall be subdued unto Him then shall the 
Son also Himself be subject unto Him that put 
all things under Him^ that God may be all in 
all. " * " The last enemy that shall be destroyed 
is death." Then shall there be no more curse. f 

Thus the new creation is finished, and it 
is God's work, not man's. He that sitteth 
upon the throne, the Lord God Almighty, 

* 1 Cor. xv. 24, 27, 28. t Rev. xxii , 3. 



196 ECCE REGNUM. 



the Creator of the heavens and the earth, Jeho- 
vah, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob ; 
the God who judged snpernaturally the Ante- 
diluvians, and saved Noah ; the Egyptians, 
and delivered the children of Israel, inter- 
poses by His mighty power and makes all 
things new. Man, here, is powerless, with all 
of his inventions and machines, with alhof his 
politics, ecclesiasticism and reformatory devi- 
ces he cannot bring the bright, supernatural 
age of gold. He cannot do it, for he cannot 
create. Indeed, we are told that he cannot 
add one cubit to his stature, or make one hair 
white or black. Though boasting great things, 
he is a weak vessel, whose breath is in his nos- 
trils, and whose glory, like the grass, wither- 
eth, or like the flower, fadeth. Wherefore, 
we cease from putting our trust in him, and 
lift up our eyes unto the hills, from whence 
cometh our help. " Our help is from the Lord, 
who made heaven and earth." His work is 
perfect. By His power, such as Christ exercised 
in the performance of His miracles, manifest 
in the changing of water to wine, the healing 



THE NEW CREATION. 19? 



of the sick, the lame and the blind, and in the 
raising of the dead, the very life and nature of 
things is reached. The source of corruption is 
probed. The hearts of men that are in His hand 
are turned. Their dead bodies awake from the 
dust, and are clothed with immortality. " The 
eyes of the blind are opened ; the ears of the 
deaf are unstopped ; the lame man leaps as an 
hart, and the tongue of the dumb sings. 
Waters break out in the wilderness, and 
streams in the desert, and it blossoms as the 
rose." The people of God labor, but not in 
vain, neither do they bring forth for trouble ; 
they are the seed of the blessed of the Lord, 
and their offspring with them." 

The animals, the vegetables and the miner- 
als are touched. u The wolf also shall dwell 
with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down 
with the kid, and the calf and the young lion 
and the f atling together, and a little child shall 
lead them ; and the cow and the bear shall feed : 
their young ones shall lie dow-n together, and 
the lion sTiall eat straw like the ox"* Here is a 



* Isaiah xxxv. 11-60. 



193 ECCE REGNUM. 



change of nature from the carniverous to the 
herbivorous. 

" In place of the thorn comes up the fir tree ; 
in place of the brier the myrtle tree." Here is 
a destruction of the noxious. 

■ ' For brass is brought gold, and for iron sil- 
ver, and for wood brass, and for stones iron." 
Here the rare and precious metals become com- 
mon, and the common are abundantly increased. 
Why, then, may there not be a city whose foun- 
dations are saphires, whose gates are pearl, and 
whose streets are gold, all transfigured in the 
glory of God, beautiful for situation, the joy of 
the whole earth, Mount Zion, Jerusalem, or 
called by that other name given by the Prophet 
" Jehovah Shamma," " The Lord is there." 

It is objected to the regeneration or glorifica- 
tion of matter that it is a carnal view ; hardly 
refined and spiritual enough is it that dust 
should partake of the heavenly. However, 
we have seen in the resurrection, that is, in 
Chrisfrand his Saints glorified, that it does thus 
partake. Their bodies made of the dust of 
the ground rise to glory. Here in Christ 



THE NEW CREATION. 



199 



certainly is a very close connection between 
eartli and heaven ; so close that we may believe 
that ultimately the whole earth, every particle 
of the dust thereof, shall be delivered from the 
bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty 
of the children of God, free to work as God de- 
signed it should in the beginning, perfectly, 
without the curse upon it. This view is not 
carnal but spiritual. 

Moreover, we believe that the saints now 
and liere discern this regeneration of ma- 
terial things. The Scripture warrants them 
in saying that old things have passed away 
and all things have become new, that is, 
spiritual or supernatural. In Christ believers 
not only at present have wisdom, righteousness, 
sanctification, redemption, revival power and 
rapture, but they are new creatures. They have 
already entered a new creation and their home 
is in it, and here they know they ought to stay, 
for to the spiritually minded is life and peace, 
and by abiding in Christ their prayers are an- 
swered and they bear much fruit. All things 



* Ezek. xlviii. 35. 



200 ECCE REGNUM. 



have become new. In the same light in which 
believers understand the new birth and discern 
the glorified body, they see the new heavens 
and the new earth. We have heard plain peo- 
ple in their experience of regeneration testify 
to this. The passage of some from nature's 
darkness has been indeed to a marvelous light. 
When blind Bartimeus, under the touch of 
Christ, was healed, he saw the natural sun and 
the glory thereof all around him, doubtless it 
was marvelous in his eyes. As really have 
some seen the glory of "that Sun that is above 
the sun," the light of the glory of God, and not 
only in the face of Jesus Christ but all around, 
the heavens declaring it and the earth reflect- 
ing it. Under the power of the spirit they have 
stood upon the Mount, and the hills and the 
valleys, the fields and woods, have been trans- 
figured around them. 

Some may pass over this testimony as they 
read it in the memoirs of Christians, or hear it 
from the lips of some brother or sister in Christ, 
as simply a freak of the imagination, while 
others may feel justified in seeing in it a fore- 



THE NEW CREATION. 201 

gleam of the latter day glory, when Christ, the 
Messiah, shall make all things new ; the reno- 
vated and Paradisaical earth being the place of 
His throne. And who, says Dr. H. Bonar — 
the same who writes the beautiful hymns — 
"who so fit to restore creation as He who first 
fashioned it. He, who as the Word made 
flesh, claims kindred with its soil. He, whose 
blood still lies ungathered upon Gethsemane 
and Golgotha ? Or, who so fit to bring deliver- 
ance to the Church and joy to Israel, as He, 
who is bone of her bone, and flesh of her flesh — 
the Son of Mary, the Son of David, the Son of 
Abraham? Or, who so worthy to receive the 
world's homage as the Lamb slain, the Lamb 
of God, that taketh away the sin of the world ? 
Or, who so meet to be the destroyer of Anti- 
christ and the binder of Satan as the very 
Christ of God, the seed of the woman, the true 
representative of the original dynasty ; the heir 
of the inheritance ; the Head of men and an- 
gels ; the anointed King of earth and Heaven. 
And what region of the universe so likely to 
be the place of His throne as this earth, whose 



202 ECCE REGNUM. 



soil has drunk in His blood ; this earth where 
He hungered and thirsted, and was weary and 
slept, and awoke and moved to and fro as one 
of its own inhabitants ; this earth w^hose fruits 
He ate, whose waters He drank, whose air he 
breathed, whose fragrance He inhaled, whose 
hills He climbed, whose olives shaded Him, 
whose sun lighted Him by day and whose moon 
and stars by night. What planet in all the fir- 
mament so likely to be the seat of His throne, the 
centre of His dominion, the metropolis of His 
empire." " And who," he says, " are we that we 
should call this carnal ? It was not carnal that 
he should lie in a manger ; how is it carnal that 
He should sit upon a throne J It was not car- 
nal that He should wear a crown of thorns ; how 
is it carnal that he should put on the crown of 
glory \ It was not carnal that he should die 
upon an earthly cross in a world of sin, amid 
the mockery of unholy men ; how is it carnal 
that He should live forever as the possessor of 
earth's kingdoms in a world of holy peace, 
amid songs of holy men below, and of the Church 
of the first born above I There is nothing car- 



THE KINGDOM COME. 203 

nal in the remembrance of His sufferings here ; 
how is there aught carnal in the anticipation of 
His reigning," 

"Hasten, Lord, the promised hour ; 
Come in glory and in power ; 
Still thy foes are unsubdued ; 
Nature sighs to be renewed, 
Time has nearly reached its sun. 
All things, with thy bride say ' come,' 
Jesus whom all worlds adore, 
Come and reign forever more." 



THE KINGDOM COME. 

We believe now that we need no more light 
than we see shines on the mount, in prophecy, 
in history, and in Christian experience, to clear 
away the clouds and give us a revelation of the 
nature and glory of the kingdom of God, The 
light is one and the same through all of these 
channels of communication, and blazes before 
us as distinctively the supernatural. We fol- 
low this and we follow the Spirit. It is the 
Spirit in distinction from the flesh, the world of 
glory to come in distinction from this present 



204 ECCE REGNUM. 



evil dispensation. Christ and his mystical glo- 
rified body, the church in distinction from 
Adam and his sinful and corruptible race. It 
is the seed of the woman of Abraham, of David 
in distinction from the seed of the serpent. It 
is Christ himself in His peculiar offices, work 
and character, in distinction from ritualism, ec- 
clesiasticism, politics and reforms. It is the lit- 
tle stone cut out of the mountain without hands 
in distinction from Nebuchadnezzar' s image of 
world kingdoms. In a word, it is supernatur- 
alism in distinction from naturalism, with a 
great gulf between, never spanned as yet by the 
natural philosopher or speculative theologian, 
but only through the redemption there is in 
Christ, which involves his incarnation, death, 
resurrection, intercession and second coming. 
Hence the gospel, God in Christ, reconciling the 
world unto Himself in distinction from all forms 
of natural religion as the wisdom of God and 
the power of God unto salvation. God in Christ 
comes across the gulf to the natural man and 
unites himself to him in the womb of the Vir- 



* Daniel ii. 31-49. 



THE KINGDOM COME 205 

gin, thereby taking Ms sin and corruption upon 
Mm. Here the divine and the human are joined, 
not fused ; they remain distinct, yet they are 
one. Of the two joined we have a new man, 
the God-man, the second Adam, the head of 
a new creation, the source of a new life to all 
who receive Him. 

" And this is the record that God hath yiven 
to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son."* 
1 'He that hath the Son hath life, and he that hath 
not the Son of God hath not life." Everything 
so far as man' s salvation is concerned, depends 
upon his receiving the Son in whom is life. The 
creature must stop running to and fro on the 
plane of naturalism in a vain attempt to estab- 
lish his own righteousness. He must cease his 
efforts to throw himself up into the supernatural, 
by some device of his own, and receive God who 
comes down in Christ to save him. It is not by 
doing, but in receiving, that a man obtains sal- 
vation. As it is written, " But as many as re- 
ceived Him to them gave He power to become 
the sons of God, even to them that believe on 

*Johnv. 11-12. 



206 ECCE REGNUM. 



His name, which were born not of blood nor of 
the will of the flesh, but of God." 

Thus, man by receiving the supernatural 
Christ is born again, made a son, and if a son 
an heir, and a joint heir with Him u to an inher- 
itance incorruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth 
not away," or, in other words, to a " kingdom 
that cannot be moved. "* He becomes a son not 
only in name but by nature. He is a new crea- 
ture. " Old things have passed away, and be- 
hold, all things have become new," supernatur- 
ally so. 

Man rises to God not by his own strength, 
but God comes down to him and lifts him up 
through a process corresponding to the raising 
of wheat, which falls into the ground, dies, 
and then appears ; u first the blade, then the ear, 
and after that, the full corn in the ear," when 
the harvest comes, and it is gathered into the 
garner. One with Christ : man dies with Him 
on the Cross, rises with Him from the grave, 
sits with Him in the Heavenlies, and appears 
with Him in His Kingdom, in the end of the 



* John i. 12. 



THE KINGDOM COME. 207 

world or dispensation, the harvest of time, when 
come the reapers — the angels. 



THE SECOND ADVEXT BEIXGS THE KXKGDOM. 

It does not appear until then. Then it does 
come to earth, like the Shekinah of old to the 
temple, and stands revealed to all nations. In 
it is "the King in His beauty' ' and all of the 
saints with Him ; not simply as His subjects, 
but as His Court. AVe see the blood-washed 
throng of the Old and New Testament dispen- 
sations ; besides the rank and file of the cen- 
turies we behold the worthy patriarchs, ' /% the 
glorious company of the Apostles, the goodly 
fellowship of the Prophets, the noble army of 
Martyrs, " all in their resurrection bodies, for 
mortal, sinful flesh, cannot inherit the King- 
dom of God. We see them in all of the glories 
of their Head and King. In Him, the saints 
are the sons of God, partakers of His nature, 
and heirs of His Kingdom. Their revelation in 
glory is the manifestation for which the groan- 



208 ECCE EEGNUM. 



ing and travailing creation has waited long. It 
doth iiot yet appear what they are, bnt when 
He who is their life comes, then they will be 
seen as they are, "they will be like Him," 
"they will appear with Him in glory." 

'Now partakers of their Lord's sufferings, 
they are the hidden ones. In the world, but 
not of it ; walking by faith, not by sight ; 
sheltered by the covenants, and sustained by 
the promises ; but there in glory where we be- 
hold them in the Kingdom, they come forth in 
raiment whiter than snow, " such as no fuller 
on earth can whiten." Majesty and grace are in 
their forms ; heaven is in their faces ; glory 
covers them as a garment ; and praise, ever- 
lasting praise unto Him who has loved them 
and redeemed them by His blood, and made 
them kings and priests unto God ; rises from 
their hearts, and ascends from their tongues. 
And now they share in the glory of the Son of 
God ; in His knowledge, His power, His good- 
ness, His fullness. By union with Christ, they 
are raised above the angels ; they judge them ; 
they perform heavenly service among their 



THE KINGDOM COME. 209 

shining ranks ; by virtue of power and glory 
divine they execute the will of Jehovah, amid 
all of the celestial hierarchies. So, they have 
work to do in Heaven. Its fields of glory are 
wide open before them. Having burst the 
bands of mortality, and, in Christ, triumphed 
over death and the grave, having been clothed 
upon from Heaven with bodies filled with 
power, and with spirits aglow with light, they 
burn like Seraphs, and reign over principali- 
ties and powers, to the end that " they may 
make known unto them the manifold wisdom 
of God." 

Not only is the glory of the Son of God upon 
them, but they partake of His glory as the -Son 
of Man. Christ was human as well as divine, 
born of a virgin as well as begotten of God the 
Father. He is called the Second Adam, hence 
He is crowned with all the glory of the first ; 
all that he had before he sinned : dominion, 
power and glory, as to humanity, perfect ! do- 
minion ovei; the earth and the fulness thereof, 
power over the race of man, the fowl of the air, 
the beasts of the field, and the fish of the sea ; 



210 ECCE REGNUM. 



power, imperial ; glory, paradisaical ; all this 
and more, as redemption is greater than creation, 
is to be found in Christ. Man now esteems the 
tarnished glory of this fallen world as of para- 
mount consequence, so that its honors, plea- 
sures, and riches are eagerly sought for. He 
desires power and high position. He loves 
wealth and all that it will bring. He loves 
houses and lands and kingdoms, a sounding 
name, the applause of the multitude, earthly 
joys and sensual pleasures. He is led by "the 
lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, and the 
pride of life." He aspires to be great in learn- 
ing and philosophy, renowned in arms and pow- 
erful in government. He delights in the skill 
of the statesman, to give wing to his imagina- 
tion and sing the song of the poet, wield the 
pencil of the painter, the chisel of the sculptor, 
the pen of the scholar, the sword of the warrior, 
touch the chords of music, thrill listening sen- 
ates, or move the populace with his eloquent 
oratory. 

There is a glory of this world that a man 
seeks in order that he may be a man, but when 



THE KINGDOM COME. 211 

borne aloft upon its highest wave, he is seen 
but a moment, and then he disappears, while 
the varied and magnificent civilization that he 
spreads abroad does not last. The sum of it 
all is but a Babylon. However, the world, as 
God created it was good, and man in the begin- 
ning was made but a little lower than the an- 
gels. Take the curse from the earth and most 
desirable as a possession would it be, transcend- 
antly beautiful would it appear. All the gior y 
of it then would not be as the Chaldee's excel- 
lency, but like Eden ; and it is this the saints 
find in the kingdom. Christ and his church 
have all of the glory of humanity, and the world 
without the sin and the curse that consumes it. 
He is the perfect man as respects every attri- 
bute and quality that goes to make one. While 
He was on the earth He showed this in His hu- 
miliation and poverty. When He comes again 
it will be seen in his exaltation and glory, and 
as with Him so with the saints, it shall be 
manifest that they are perfect men in Him ; 
now, even, the process is begun that shall bring 
the fullness of the stature. Very imperfect, 



212 ECCE REGNUM, 



Christains may seem now, to those who are 
pleased to judge them, but God sees them, and 
though they are in the rough, his hand is upon 
them to make them comely, and so they shall 
appear without wrinkle or spot, or any such 
thing. u As the marble wastes the statue 
grows." 

That beggar, Lazarus, is a king and a priest, 
only it doth not yet appear that he is. In gar- 
rets and in cellars, in prisons and in huts, in 
bondage and as free, at the North, at the 
South, at home and abroad, among all lands, 
w^e can find them that the world does not rec- 
ognize as of its glory at all, who shall " shine 
as the stars," "wear crowns," u judge an- 
gels," "and have power over the nations." 
Wherefore, as Christians are so dignified by 
their heavenly calling, how ought they to rise 
in all of the perfection of Christian manhood, 
and everywhere acquit themselves like men. 

But Christ was not only the Son of God and 
the Son of man, but He was the Son of David, 
and as such there is a glory that attaches to 
Him as the heir of David's throne and King- 



THE KINGDOM COME. 213 

dom ; a glory that not only descends upon 
Him, but upon those who are His. This is the 
glory of the Messiah of Israel expected by the 
Jewish nation ; a glory that comes through be- 
ing a lineal descendant of David, according to 
the flesh ; by Mary and Joseph, literal ; his- 
torical, on the earth, direct from David's loins, 
even as was Solomon. David had a throne and 
a kingdom on this earth, and this kingdom in 
his seed was to last forever. Though it might 
be overturned and overturned, yet it should rise 
never to be moved. As it is written concern- 
ing it in the time of Zedekiah : " For thus 
saith the Lord God, remove the diadem, and 
take off the crown ; this shall not be the same ; 
exalt him that is low, and abase him that is 
high. I will overturn, overturn, overturn it, 
and it shall be no more until he come whose 
rigid it is, and I will give it him."* And who 
is He whose right it is if it is not the child 
whom the Angel told Mary should be called 
Jesus ? Indeed, the same angel, Gabriel, at 
the same time, in the same breath, when he an- 

* Ezek. xxi, 26,27. 



214 ECCE REGNUM. 



nounced his name to Mary, said that He 
should " sit upon the throne of David and 
reign over Jacob ;' ' and though this same child 
that was born of the Virgin and whose name 
was called Jesus, lived thirty-three years in 
Palestine, and then died without fulfilling in 
His own proper person this prediction, yet we 
believe He shall do it when He comes "the 
second time without sin unto salvation ; " that 
is, when He comes in the clouds of Heaven to 
Mount Olives in like manner as he ascended ; 
comes in the same body that he was born 
of the Virgin in, the same in which he ate 
and drank, walked and talked while he was 
here on the earth, the same that was crucified 
on the cross, buried in the grave, and that 
arose therefrom and never saw corruption, the 
same that by the genealogies recorded in the 
Gospel, was according to the flesh the seed 
of the woman of Abraham and of David, and 
whom the Jews at last rejected as their king. 
The Bible being true, we cannot see how Jesus 
can fail of the Kingdom of his Father David, 
the same that David possessed, the same seat 



THE KINGDOM COME. 215 



of sovereignty that lie held over Israel on the 
hills of Palestine, at Jerusalem, in Mount Zion. 
It would seem that language must be strangely 
twisted, as the Scriptures are read, to prove the 
contrary, for certainly the Lord speaks in no 
ambiguous terms when he says, "I have sworn 
unto David, my servant, thy seed will I estab- 
lish and build up thy throne to all generations. 
I have found David my servant, with my holy 
oil have I annointed him. I will make him 
higher than the kings of the earth, my mercy 
will I keep for him forevermore, and my cove- 
nant shall stand fast with him. His seed also 
will I make to endure forever, and his throne 
as the days of Heaven. If his children for- 
sake my law and walk not in my judgments : 
if they break my statutes and keep not my 
commandments, then will I visit their trans- 
gressions with the rod and their iniquity with 
stripes. Nevertheless will I not utterly take 
from him, nor suffer my faithfulness to fail ; 
my covenant will I not break, nor alter the 
thing that is gone out of my lips. Once have 
I sworn by my holiness that I will not lie unto 



216 ECCE REGNUM. 



David. His seed shall endure forever, and his 
throne as the sun before me, It shall be estab- 
lished forever as the moon, as a faithful witness 
in Heaven," and David believed this. By faith 
he saw it all fulfilled in Christ. He looked for- 
ward to it in Him raised from the dead. 
As it is written: "The Lord hath sworn in 
truth unto David, He will not turn from it. 
Of the fruit of thy body will I set up thy throne. 
" Therefore," David, '' being a prophet, and 
knowing that God had sworn with an oath to 
him, that of the fruit of his loins according to 
the flesh he would raise "up Christ to sit on his 
throne. He, seeing this before, spoke of the 
resurrection of Christ, that his soul was not 
left in hell,* neither his flesh see corruption." 
David, being a prophet, saw it all, saw his 
kingdom restored and perpetuated in Christ. 
Hence, his Messianic Psalms, so full of the 
glory of his kingdom — psalms that cannot be 
understood without faith in Christ, as the king 
who is to restore the kingdom to Israel. As 
with David so with all the patriarchs and propli- 

* Acts ii. 30, 31. 



THE NEW CREATION. 217 

ets, tliey saw it all in Christ ; by inspiration of 
the Spirit, in the light of heaven, they looked 
forward to the Messianic glory. "They all 
died in the faith, not having received the prom- 
ises, but were persuaded of them and confessed 
that they were pilgrims and strangers in the 
earth." * Read the covenants and the promises 
that were made to the worthies of the Old Tes- 
tament dispensation. Read the descriptions of 
Israel's future in the prophesies. Behold how 
they point to a Person who is to come and be 
higher than the kings of the earth. See how 
they testify to a heavenly kingdom on the earth, 
and the triumph of a seed in whom all the na- 
r tions of the earth shall be blessed. 

The promise was to Abraham and his seed, 
that he should have the land of Canaan for an 
everlasting possession. It was the same to the 
other patriarchs ; yet they never have had it as 
such a possession, and now they never can 
have it unless they are raised from the dead. 
If God is to keep His word to the holy men, as 

Heb. xi. 



218 ECCE REGNUM. 



recorded in tlie Old Testament, there must be 
a resurrection. 

There will be a resurrection, the tribes of Is- 
rael will be restored to their own land ; Abra- 
ham, Isaac and Jacob, will inherit Palestine, 
and Christ their seed and David's, after the 
flesh, shall sit on David's throne and reign 
over Jacob, and all of the saints with Him 
shall reign on the earth. " The heathen shall 
be given to Him for an inheritance, and the ut- 
termost parts of the earth for a possession." 
So the word of the Lord shall not fail. The 
aerial heavens may be rolled together as a 
scroll, the elements melt with fervent heat, the 
earth leel and stagger under judgment fires, 
but the word of the Lord with the Fathers will 
be kept ; not a jot or tittle of it shall fail, for 
" Christ is risen," " His name is Faithful and 
True." " The government shall be upon His 
shoulders, and His name shall be called Won- 
derful, Counsellor, the mighty God, the everlast- 
ing Father, the Prince of Peace. Of the increase 
of His government and peace there shall be no 
end upon the throne of David and upon his 



THE KINGDOM COME. 219 

kingdom, to order it and to establish it with 
judgment and with justice from henceforth even 
forever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will per- 
form this."* 

From the foregoing, we see that the manifes- 
tation of Christ in His Kingdom on the earth 
is a revelation of the glories of His person. 
AVe have observed that the great theme of the 
Prophets was the sufferings of Christ and the 
glories that should follow. Now, the suffer- 
ings were connected with His person and visi- 
bly manifest in Palestine and on Calvary. 
They have passed into history, and literally, and 
in no figurative sense do we believe ' ' He was 
wounded for our transgressions and bruised for 
our iniquities." " He bore our sins in His own 
body, on the tree;" if He did not, then we 
must bear them ourselves and sink down under 
the burden. Now, as the sufferings, so we see 
that the glories, are connected with His person. 
They are all in Him and are to become visible 
on this earth. They are to become history, 
and, literally, believers are to partake of them 

* Isaiah ix., 6, 7. 



220 



ECCE REGNUM. 



in Him, even as did Moses and Elijah on the 
Mount of Transfiguration. This being reason- 
able and true, it follows that we are not follow- 
ing cunningly devised fables in making known 
His Majesty ; and seeing in Him and in His 
saints risen and glorified a royal company of 
kings and priests, who shall take possession of 
this earth and reign over it gloriously. We 
are not visionary and fanatical if, while we 
sing, 

' ' Jesus shall reign where'er the sun 
Doth his successive journeys run," 

we believe that the same Jesus, who was born 
of the Virgin Mary, and is now risen and gone 
to Heaven, shall come again, and historically, 
literally, in all the bright glories of His person 
reign as really as he ever suffered. Why be- 
lieve anything less than this ? AVhy dissolve 
the person into the principles of righteousness, 
joy and peace in the Holy Ghost, and say that 
the reign of Christ on this earth is visibly to 
be nothing more than that of men with hearts 
regenerated. Why not hold the Head, and 
with Him get all other things " which are in 



THE KINGDOM COME, 221 

heaven and which are on earth/' and which 
gathered together in one shall be made mani- 
fest in all of their perfection, when He himself 
shall appear personally in His glory, and usher 
in the dispensation of the fullness of times ? 
Why not, since in this way only do we obtain 
the kingdom in its fullness, that is, the trans- 
figuration, wherein is seen not only righteous- 
ness, purity, life, power and brightness, but 
persons, a king and saints visibly on a glorified 
earth, standing before men in the flesh and ad- 
mired by them ? Why not hold the Head and 
so have Christ himself, as well as the influences 
of the Holy Spirit, the resurrection of the body, 
a new heavens and a new earth, and a new Jeru- 
salem as well as a new heart \ 

Is the kingdom of God, as it shall be mani- 
fest on the earth, to have no glory of Christ's 
person in it, but simply be a reign of princi- 
ples as seen in mortal bodies, formal insti- 
tutions, civil and ecclesiastical establishments 
and reformatory societies ? 

Is it to be merely a regeneration of the heart 
while it is but a reformation of all things with- 



222 



ECCE REGNUM. 



out ? then it is not a kingdom of unity, harmo- 
ny and perfection. It is a mixture of the old 
Adam and Christ, an alliance of natures that 
are opposed to each other. It is the spirit in 
worldly forms, and as the old garment is too 
rotten for the new cloth, the old bottles too 
weak for the new wine, so there is a rent or an 
explosion. Wherefore, we say that such an 
idea of the kingdom to come will not hold. 
That alone must be true which has the unity 
of nature, which harmonizes the external with 
the internal, form with substance, and brings 
all things in heaven and earth together in unity 
and perfection. 

The transfiguration does this. When the 
Lord comes in his glory, old things pass away, 
all things become new, supernaturally, sub- 
stantially and formally so. In Him, the hu- 
man and the divine, heaven and earth, the su- 
pernatural and natural, faith and reason, church 
and state, science and theology, the religious 
and the political, the spiritual and the material, 
life and doctrine, ||belief and practice, are seen 
to harmonize in one bright revelation that 






THE KINGDOM C03IE, 223 



throws the light of heaven upon all the para- 
doxical and seemingly inconsistent truths of 
the Bible, settles all philosophical and theolog- 
ical disputations, scatters all conflicting schools, 
sects, cliques, and parties in church and state, 
fairly adjusts all human relations, blends au- 
thority with liberty, freedom with law, and 
brings in that happiness, peace, prosperity and 
good government for which the nations have 
long but vainly been struggling. Truly, it will 
be a glorious time when the free will of man 
shall blend with the gracious sovereignty of 
Grod, and his proud reason be one with child- 
like trust in the Redeemer : when all questions 
that agitate the people and disturb their peace 
are righteously settled, and never any more 
shall there be a tyrant or demagogue in the 
state, or a Pharisee or hypocrite in the church 
to hurt or destroy. Such a time is coming. 
Naturally, Ave see little prospect of it, but su- 
pernaturally, at the revelation of Christ's per- 
son, it is made certain. In the light of the 
transfiguration, in the light of prophecy, of 
history and Christian experience, it is clear that 



224 ECCE REGKUM. 



sin and the curse is to be removed, and a king- m 
dom of righteousness and peace established on 
this earth in heavenly glory. It shall rise upon 
the ruins of all the kingdoms of the earth, and 
stand out as a literal fact, or distinct object in 
history, embracing a territory, subjects, laws 
and a king, even as to-day Great Britain and 
the United States are literal governments in the 
earth, though of inferior glory. So, in the 
light of Heaven, the Holy Spirit has taught us 
as He has led us in the word from passage to 
passage and from revelation to revelation, as 
He has brought us from the little mustard seed 
even the kingdom of righteousness, joy and 
peace hid in the hearts of believers to the bloom- 
ing tree thereof, wherein is manifested the glory 
of the transfiguration, the redemption of the 
body, and the new creation, wherein all of the 
covenants with the patriarchs and the sure 
word of the prophets are fulfilled ; the visions 
of Daniel and Ezekiel, and the Messianic glories 
of Isaiah and David ; also, the words of Christ 
concerning His second advent, where he declares 
plainly that it is then the Kingdom comes : 



THE KINGDOM COME. 225 

u The kingdom prepared from the foundation 
of the world,"* the same that Adam had but 
lost ; wherein, once more, as we look, there 
comes the brightest revelation of them all, the 
same the Apostle John saw by inspiration of the 
Spirit when he was an exile in Patmos : " And 
I saw, ' ' he says, ' ' a new Heaven and a new earth, 
for the first Heaven and the first earth were 
passed away ; and there was no more sea ; and 
I, John, saw the Holy City, New Jerusalem, 
coming down from God out of Heaven, pre- 
pared as a bride for her husband, and I heard 
a great voice out of Heaven saying, Behold, 
the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will 
dwell with them and they shall be His people, 
and God himself shall be with them and be 
their God, and God shall wipe away all tears 
from their eyes, and there shall be no more 
death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall 
there be any more pain. * * And the city 
had no need of the sun, neither of the moon to 
shine in it, for the glory of God did lighten it, 
and the Lamb is the light thereof. And the 

• Mat. xxv. S4. 



226 ECCE REGNUM. 



nations of them which are saved shall walk in 
the light of it ; and the kings of the earth do 
bring their glory and honor into it ; and the 
gates of it shall not be shut by day, for there 
shall be no night there ; and they shall bring 
the glory and honor of the nations into it ; and 
there shall in no wise enter into it any thing 
that defile th, neither whatsoever worketh abom- 
ination or maketh a lie ; but they which are 
written in the Lamb's Book of Life."* 

A distinguished writer has said: " Reason 
demands as the end and destination of man in 
society a state in which the divine law shall 
organize itself in civil polity, and form the 
basis and determine the conduct of social life ; 
in other words, a theocracy or kingdom of 
heaven." f 

True — Now what reason demands the Bible re- 
veals. A heavenly poletia or city comes down to 
man, and with the person of Jesus Christ the 
Kingdom of Heaven appears and manifests it- 
self supernaturally. 

* Rev. xxi. 

t F. H. Hodge. D.D., Unitarian Review, Vol, 5, No. 3, page 228. 



THE KINGDOM COME. 227 

The divine law then is organized in civil 
polity, and the conduct of men in all of 
their relations is determined thereby, but with 
all this there is the personal presence of 
the Saviour King. What reason demands, 
what the struggling peoples everywhere have 
tried to secure, life, liberty, happiness, good 
government, comes then not according to 
nature, politically by the wisdom of man, but 
from above through the Lord Jesus Christ, in 
the accomplishment of the plan of redemption. 
Is it not time for all sects and parties in Church 
and State to see this truth, that they may be- 
come united and saved from the deplorable re- 
sults of schism and contention ? Let there be a 
fixedness of eye upon the coming kingdom, so 
that wherever the Lord's prayer ascends in the 
words "Thy Kingdom Come," there shall be 
the bright vision of the Lord' s personal appear- 
ing before the soul, and we might expect the 
true evangelical alliance to appear in a union 
of Christians everywhere, not merely in formal 
statements of doctrine, adapted to all shades of 
opinion, from High to Low or Old to New, not 



228 ECCE REGNUM. 



in rites and ceremonies, plain or elaborate, not 
in a form of government comprehensive of all 
forms, but in a union in Christ, the only sub- 
stantial union, that which belongs to His person, 
His mystical glorified body, that union which 
the Holy Ghost reveals, that which is begotten 
and perpetuated by this power and formally 
becomes manifest in perfection, when all true 
believers of all ages, all nations, and all de- 
nominations, shall appear with the Lord in 
glory as one Church, or one body, without 
wrinkle or spot, or any such thing. - 

Most desirable indeed is a formal union of 
Christians, but unless it is spiritual in Christ 
it is destructive of all that promotes their hap- 
piness and the good of society. The letter, the 
form killeth ; reformation without regenera- 
tion and resurrection is but a change from bad 
to worse, and the last state of the man or the 
world, out of which has been cast one devil, 
making a room all prepared, swept, and gar- 
nished, for seven other evil spirits, is worse 
than the first. Said a learned Doctor of di- 
vinity to a young student in theology, " Don't 



THE KINGDOM COME. 999 



spend your time in tinkering old kettles." 
Is there not a vast deal of tinkering among 
the leaders in society? The body politic, 
bleeds at every pore, because of the incessant 
pounding it gets from reformers. It is too 
much governed, and it has become a question 
these days, how much longer it can stand it. 
In the process there is a great deal of noise, 
and so, the age is styled, an active and pro- 
gressive one, as though activity was neces- 
sarily genuine progress. We remember that 
there was once a building erected on this earth 
without the sound of the hammer. It was the 
temple of Solomon. There was a glory of his, 
also, that much astonished the Queen of Sheba. 
That temple was the type of a greater house 
made without hands, eternal in the heavens,* the 
body of Christ, the Church, the new Jerusalem. 
That glory was the earnest of a more resplend- 
ant brightness that in the end shall fill the 
earth as the waters cover the sea. A greater 
than Solomon reigns invisibly now among all 
of the inhabitants of the earth. He is no tinker- 
ing reformer, but the master workman who ere- 



r 



230 ECCE REGNUM. 



ates and regenerates. He is the Great Physi- 
cian who heals by a word. He is the coming 
man this world needs 

We look for His appearing and His kingdom. 
By faith we see His 1 person, by the hearing of 
His word we receive His kingdom. We are told 
by the king Himself that it is like a mustard 
seed which a man took. We take it, then, germ- 
inally, as it is offered freely. In the germ we 
have it now, bark, leaves, branches, frnit and 
all ; wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, re- 
demption, revival power, rapture, a new crea- 
tion, a kingdom that cannot be moved, free, 
present and full. We take it as it is offered, 
for nothing, for we are not worth enongh to buy 
it. In receiving it our fortune is made. We 
cannot be poor while heirs with Christ to the 
eternal inheritance. Receiving it, the believer 
waits for its manifestation. By faith he keeps 
it before him as he sees it in the Scripture ; there 
he finds it. The Spirit, the light of the glory 
of God shining upon the page reveals it, so that 
in view of it, like Abel, he offers an excellent 
sacrifice ; like Enoch, walks with God ; like 



THE KINGDOM COME. 



231 



Noah warns the world of judgment, and abides 
in Christ as his ark ; like Abraham, trusts 
where he cannot see, and, like Moses, forsakes 
the world, casts in his lot with the people of 
God, has respect to the reward that shall come 
at the resurrection of the just, fears no man, 
and endures as seeing him who is invisible. 

So it is that a view by faith of the Kingdom 
of Heaven inspires, encourages, strengthens 
and sustains the believer. Rising full orbed 
and splendid before him, it draws him up to a 
" higher life." The disciples were asleep be- 
fore they beheld it, but afterwards they would 
have busied themselves by building tabernacles. 
Nothing short of a kingdom answerable to that 
seen on the Mount can really satisfy the be- 
liever if he has had but even a glimpse of the 
brightness of the Father's glory; none of the 
kingdoms of this world are sufficient. "They 
vanish as a dim candle dies at noon." All of 
the pomp and splendor of Solomon's Court, 
that so affected the Queen, though a type, 
is not the kingdom he is looking for. He 
cannot be satisfied with this groaning and 



232 ECCE REGNUM. 



travailing earth, with death, and the curse 
resting upon it, though all the inhabitants 
in it should be converted to God ; though on 
every hill there should be a meeting-house, 
and in every valley a school-house ; though 
all things should be held in common, and 
there should be no poor people in the land ; 
though the American eagle should scream 
from every mountain crag, and the Goddess of 
Liberty should lift her pole and cap upon a 
Christian temple in Jerusalem, and all of the 
people should make pilgrimages thither in 
comfortable and safe baloons. No, the devel- 
opment of this world's civilization, however 
extensive and wonderful, is not enough. The 
believer can only be satisfied when he awakes 
in the likeness of his Redeemer. He knows 
that mortal flesh and blood cannot inherit the 
Kingdom of God, neither doth corruption in- 
herit incorruption. The old body to which sin 
and death clings must be put off, and an incor- 
ruptible one be given him before he can be 
satisfied. Redemption must be in the flower 
as well as in the seed. Death must be robbed 



THE KINGDOM COME. 233 

of its prey and the grave of its victory, before 
the Kingdom that he prays for, longs for, and 
waits for, comes. 

The blessed hope, that like an anchor holds 
him does not stop this side of the resurrection, 
not even in the intermediate state. It passes 
on to ' ' the glorious appearing of the Great God, 
his Saviour." To the coming of an " innu- 
merable company of angels and saints." To 
"the manifestation of the sons of God." To 
"the City that hath foundations, whose builder 
and maker is God. To the "New Jerusa- 
lem," " Mount Zion in glory." To the Apos- 
tles, seated on twelve thrones, judging the 
twelve tribes of Israel." To "the first resur- 
rection." "To the restitution of all things, 
which God hath spoken by the mouth of all 
His holy prophets since the world began." 
To "the new heavens and the new earth." 

To the friends that have gone before, but 
will meet Him in Glory and talk with Him, 
even as Moses, Elijah, and Christ conversed 
with each other on the Mount. To the trees, 
the fruits, the flowers, the streams, the birds, 



234 ECCE REGNUM. 



the songs, the music, the light, the in- 
habitants, the hopes, the pxirity, the fellow- 
ship, the " righteousness, the joy, the peace, 
of the Holy Ghost" and the New Creation. 

Our Father which art in heaven, Hal- 
lowed be Thy name, Thy Kingdom come, 
Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven. 
Give us this day our daily bread. And for- 
give us our debts as we forgive our debtors. 
And lead us not into temptation, but de- 
liver us from evil. For Thine is the King- 
dom and the power and the glory forever. 
Amen. 

So let our lips and lives express 
The holy gospel we profess ; 
So let our works and virtues shine 
To prove the doctrine all divine. 

Thus shall we best proclaim abroad, 
The honor of our Savior God ; 
When His salvation reigns within, 
And grace subdues the power of sin. 

Religion bears our spirits up, 
While we expect that blessed hope, 
The bright appearance of the Lord. 
And faith stands leaning on His word. 







■ "\ I 



